


One After Another

by ghastly7



Series: One After Another: The Series [1]
Category: Splatoon
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/F, Jesus everyone is suffering, Post-Octo Expansion DLC, Things will continually go to shit, help them, i.e. everything goes to shit immediately
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-09
Updated: 2019-11-21
Packaged: 2020-01-07 14:14:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 34
Words: 50,593
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18412310
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ghastly7/pseuds/ghastly7
Summary: Eight's fight with Agent Three was going just fine. She was winning, even. But then Three pulled a knife.





	1. Chapter 1

Agent Eight dodged out of the way of yet another spray of ink. She bobbed and weaved, shooting when she could, but the odds weren't in her favor. Her opponent had skills beyond those of any other inkling, and experience to add on top of it. She was powerful. She was dangerous.

She was Agent Three.

If Eight had it her way, she would have never gone up against the other agent in a fight ever again. But, of course, the stupid phone had ruined that. Now the octoling was in a fight for her and MC Cuttlefish's lives, and for the last few meters to the surface.

Despite the chances, Eight was doing well. All of the combat that she had experienced in the metro had led up to this, and she certainly wasn't out of practice. And a turning point really appeared when Eight knocked the Hero Shot out of Three's hands.

The gun slid across the floor of the elevator, and, despite Agent Three's desperate attempt to dive for it, it careened off of the edge into the depths below.

Heck yes. Eight was nailing this.

She leveraged her Octo Shot at the corrupted inkling and smirked. Checkmate.

But then Three did something that Eight hadn't been expecting. She pulled a knife.

Eight examined it. It looked like a hunting knife, mainly for getting food or cutting ropes, but it could definitely be used to harm someone. And getting stabbed wouldn't just lead to an inkling or octoling getting splatted and respawning. No, a knife like that could very well kill someone. The edge was sharp and Three seemed to know how to use it and-

Eight yelped in pain. Clearly she had been distracted, because Three had easily embedded the knife into the octoling's gut.

“Eight?!” Pearl exclaimed in her ear.

Three twisted the knife, making Eight cry out even louder in pain, before pulling it out and leaving Eight to drop to the floor.

Time seemed to slow down for the octoling. She was in so, so much pain, but she couldn't just give up. She still needed to make it to the surface, and Three still needed to be saved from this corruption.

Her balance failing and tears biting at the corners of her eyes, Eight fired a last few well-aimed shots before collapsing to the ground. The red ink struck the ooze encapsulating the right side of Three's face and finally knocked it off. The agent was knocked unconscious almost immediately.

In a way, Eight envied her. She wished that she was unconscious. It would have been nice to not have to feel the burning pain in her midsection. She clutched at the wound. Oh, it was bleeding heavily. The blood may have looked like normal ink, but it was way more important for living. And was usually preferable inside of the body.

“Eight, hang on! We'll come help you!” Marina said into the coms.

“Stay alive down there!” Pearl said.

“You have to hang on!” Cuttlefish said as he hung from the ceiling.

Marina's voice again. “Just stay with us, Eight! Stay with-” but Eight stopped being able to hear the words being said. They became a garbled-up mess of blurred noise in her ears, much like her surroundings. The pain was too much. The noise was too much. The light was too much.

Eight closed her eyes. Maybe that would make everything stop hurting so much…

 

* * *

 

Everything that happened next was blurry to Eight. She could vaguely make out being carried up a ladder, but dizziness made it difficult to tell. Was there a bandage across her midsection? How had that gotten there?

It sounded like panicked voices, but Eight didn't understand why. Had someone gotten hurt? Hopefully it wasn't Three. That would be a shame. Eight had spent so long trying to save her. Hopefully she didn't need saving all over again.

Why did her tummy hurt? Had she eaten something unhealthy? No, not possible. She only ever had nutrition cubes in the octarian army, and she'd hardly eaten anything at all in the metro.

Oh. It looked like they were at the top of the ladder, or at least the blurry shapes seemed to suggest so. That was a short climb. Had she passed out midway through? She couldn't remember.

What was that new, blurry shape coming out of the water? It kind of looked like a big statue of a human. But that would be stupid. The voices around her seemed to grow more frantic. Why? It was just a friendly man-statue.

Oh, why was she suddenly so sleepy? Well, she was sure no one would mind if she rested her eyes for just a little bit.

Just…

a little bit…..

 

* * *

 

“-don’t indicate a full charge, but it looks like it's going to fire anyway!”

Eight slowly opened her eyes. Well, she could see now. That was good. The searing pain didn't help, though.

And now that she could see… yep. That was a giant statue alright. But now it was covered in pink and green ink. Pearl and Marina undoubtedly. Speaking of which…

“No! We have no way to stop him!” said Pearl from a few feet away. “If we had a better angle I might be able to use my vocal chords, but…”

“You will blend into… the perfect world the professor envisioned,” said a voice from inside of the statue. “Farewell to you and that worthless cesspool of a city.”

Farewell to-

Eight turned to look at what the cannon protruding from the statue's mouth was aiming at, and she was upset to find out that it was a city full of people.

No. She couldn't finally make it to the surface just to see its civilization destroyed. She refused.

Eight tried desperately to get up. It felt like getting stabbed all over again with every motion. By the time she was on her hands and knees she was panting and felt like passing out all over again. But she couldn't. She wouldn't. She-

The cannon fired. Green goop went shooting across the sky and straight into the city. It didn't cover the whole place, but a solid chunk was coated in this disgusting ooze.

Pearl dropped to her knees, staring at the carnage. She looked exhausted, battered, and defeated. “No… Inkopolis…”

All any of them could do was watch as part of the city was violated, destroyed, defiled. They were helpless.

They had lost.


	2. Chapter 2

It wasn't long before the police showed up. Well, it was long enough for Pearl and Marina to tear through the statue and look for Tartar, only to find that he had disappeared. But yes, then the police force showed up in their own helicopters.

All of those present at the top of Kamabo were detained. It was understandable, really. Part of Inkopolis had just been destroyed, and they were in a very incriminating spot. Eight just wished that the police didn't jostle her so much. It hurt like hell.

The inklings and octolings were brought to a police station, if you could call it that. To be honest, the Inkopolis police force wasn't exactly an organized division. It was some people who wanted to do good for the community while also making money for their efforts, sure, but they almost never had to get involved with actual crises. The most they usually had to deal with was kids turfing too late into the night.

Agent 3, Captain Cuttlefish, Marina and Pearl were kept in a small room with a table for a while. Three had woken up on the way there, and was not at all happy about the treatment. One minute she had been shooting at that octoling girl against her will, the next she was being dragged into a police helicopter. Sure, she could understand if it were just her. She could handle that. But did the damn police have to take the others, too?

The police at least had the decency to take Eight to a hospital after Three had  _ stabbed _ her. Of course, the octoling was under heavy custody, but at least she would get the help she needed.

Pearl and Marina weren't kept for long. Their reputation as Off the Hook essentially gave them a get-out-of-jail-free card. They said their goodbyes and vowed that they would help fix this.

Yeah, sure. Because clearly they had control of  _ anything _ in this situation.

Callie and Marie showed up a while later, and their connections to Three and Cuttlefish were verified. The two were free to go.

“But before you leave, I do want to discuss something with you,” said the female police officer who sat at the other end of the table. She placed an object wrapped in cloth on the surface and began unwrapping it. It was the knife that Three had used, and it was still covered in Eight's blood.

“We have found traces of your ink on this knife,” the policewoman said to Three. The agent didn't look at her. Her eyes were glued on the weapon.

“Yeah, and what about it?” Three asked, trying to mask the horror in her voice.

“Well, we have made a few discoveries about the other person we took in,” the policewoman said. “It turns out, she's not an inkling at all.”

“Hm?” Marie hummed, seemingly feigning ignorance. It was true that she hadn't gotten the chance to hear anything about the situation, though.

“The doctors tending to her wounds also ran some tests on her DNA, and it has been confirmed. She's actually an evil octoling.”

Three clenched her fist. Evil? Cuttlefish had told her all of the details of what she had missed in the metro. Eight clearly had no evil intent. She was just an octoling who was trying to make a better life for herself. And all of the hell she had gone through… not to mention the fact that Three (she couldn't stress this enough) had  _ stabbed _ her! Right before she was at the surface, too. What kind of a douchebag does that?

“I guess what I'm trying to say is,” the officer said to Three, before suddenly bowing her head, “thank you. You were fighting this octoling scum and probably prevented her from doing more damage to the city than she already did. You stabbing her very well may have saved thousands of lives.”

Three's fist clenched so hard that her nails dug into her palms. She wanted to sock this pig in the face so bad. But Marie grabbed her wrist before she could do anything reckless.

Three wanted to scream at the policewoman. To say that she hadn't wanted to do what she did. That the woman had no right to call Eight scum. But her rage was so powerful that it kept her silent. She couldn't articulate her current feelings in any vocal fashion. She was just stunned. The burning sensation around her eye and the dull pain on the back of her head were not helping.

“So you're going to arrest her, then?” Captain Cuttlefish asked.

“That's right,” the policewoman said.

“Would you mind if we went to see her in the hospital first?” Cuttlefish continued.

The officer looked a bit confused. “I mean, I guess… if you really want to see her, I'll take you.”

So the four were driven to the hospital by the policewoman. Unfortunately, due to the officer's prying ears, Three couldn't explain any of the situation to Marie and Callie. Hopefully they didn't  _ actually _ think that Eight was a criminal, and hopefully they didn't think that Three used that knife on purpose.

They went through the hospital until they found Eight's room. They could see her through a long window in the wall. It seemed the doctors were done operating on her, as she had a new bandage across her waist and a blood bag dripping into her arm. She was simply sat up and looking around the room she was in.

“Off the record, I would have preferred that they hadn't done anything to help her,” their policewoman guide said spitefully. “After what she did to the city, I don't think she deserves this. We might as well have left her to die on that sea base.”

“Are you sure that she's to blame?” Cuttlefish asked. It was a leading question, to be sure.

“Well, she hasn't been  _ convicted _ of anything, but I think we all know that it's her fault,” the officer said. “I mean, she's an  _ octoling _ .”

Three gritted her teeth. She wanted to say something. Why couldn't she say anything? Damn her lack of capability in social situations…

Three just kept staring at the octoling she had injured. That was, until Eight gazed straight back into her eyes. Then she turned away. Eight probably hated her for stabbing her. If Three had just been smarter, just didn't get caught by that stupid phone… she couldn't handle that guilt right now.

 

Eight caught sight of Three looking at her. As soon as she did, though, Three instantly averted her eyes. Why?

Oh. Three probably hated her. Because of her incompetence, part of Inkopolis had been destroyed. If she hadn't gotten injured, she wouldn't have taken up so much of Pearl and Marina's time, and they probably could have saved everyone. This was Three's home, right? Of course she would hate Eight. It just made sense.

It wasn't like Eight expected to be instantly accepted by everyone the moment that she stepped on the surface, but for some reason the thought that Three hated her was particularly hurtful. The agent was one of the few inklings that she felt a close connection with, Eight supposed, even though she had only really seen the agent in combat or unconscious. But… Eight understood why Three would be so frustrated with her.

It didn't make it hurt less, though...

 

Three spent the rest of the time avoiding looking at the octoling. She just couldn't bear to see the damage she had caused.

Eventually the policewoman led them out of the hospital, and then she left them alone. Finally.

The group was silent for a bit. Then Callie spoke.

“Okay, spill,” she said.

“So that's where you two have been?” Marie said. “Underwater, in some kind of a secret base?”

“Yeah,” Three said. Fatigue was starting to get to her. This had been a long, long day.

“So… is it actually her fault?” Callie asked.

“NO!” Three said, a little too loudly. “Fuck, sorry, no. It's my fault. There was an evil phone thingie and it was gooping people everywhere and Eight had to go through a bunch of challenges and stupid CQ Cumber kept blowing her up and-”

“Whoa, whoa, Agent 3,” Captain Cuttlefish said. “I think you should go get some rest. Today has been hell for you. I'll explain everything to my granddaughters.”

Three was out of words, so she just silently nodded and then super jumped away.

“Yeah, we need explanations,” Callie said. “Her and the octoling looked like they had gone through the ringer.”

Cuttlefish sighed. “Yeah, this wasn't easy for either of them.” He walked over to a railing to lean on. “I guess I should start from the beginning.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, so if you like this, you should go read my story **Shenanigans in Smash Mansion**. I upload it daily and the upload schedule is way more consistent than what this fic's will be.
> 
> More terrible things to come in this story, though. :)


	3. Chapter 3

Eight was moved from the hospital to a holding cell the next day, against the doctor's recommendations. But that was okay. Honestly, Eight didn't understand why they had helped her in the first place. She had only been a footsoldier in the octarian army, and up here she was even less. Shouldn't medical care be reserved for important people, not people like her? Eight just couldn't understand it.

She was situated in her cell, and she was surprised to find that the accommodations were actually nicer than she was used to. What were the Inklings doing? Why would they give prisoners nicer beds  _ and _ first aid? She wasn't used to having a bed at all, actually, so any bed was nicer. The surface was weird.

 

* * *

 

Three looked at herself in the mirror and was disgusted. That damn sludge left a permanent scar on her face. It wasn't super noticeable or even a gross color, but  _ she _ could tell where her skin got darker because of that mind control goop.

Three gritted her teeth. She was going to live with the shame of having been caught for the rest of her fucking life. Great.

As this thought passed through her mind, the scarred area on her face started burning again. Three winced and headed to her meager kitchen. She dug through the cabinets and found what she was looking for. The godsend, the one, the only, painkillers!

She took two, then looked at the bottle again and took another one. It started helping with the pain a few minutes later when she was in bed, exhausted beyond belief but completely unable to fall asleep.

All she could think about was all of the ways she could have avoided getting taken over like that. If she had gotten to the blender in less time or had actually landed after her attack or…

Three got back out of bed. She knew for a fact that she wasn't going to sleep tonight. She was shaken to the core. Three, defeater of the  _ entire _ octarian army and vanquisher of DJ Octavio, had so easily been defeated and used. Used to almost kill someone, in fact.

Three put her vest back on and grabbed her Hero Shot from where she had haphazardly discarded it. She was never going to let that happen again. She would push herself until no one would dare try to mess with her  _ ever _ again. That was a promise.

She climbed onto her fire escape, and then super jumped to a place that she knew she would be alone.

 

* * *

 

“Hey, they'll be okay,” Pearl said as they entered their mansion.

“But will Inkopolis?” Marina said. “God, I can't believe we dropped the ball like that…”

“Chill out,” Pearl said. “We did the best we could. And the whole city’d probably be like that if we hadn't done everything we did.”

Marina sat down on a chair and wrung her hands through her tentacles. “But the others are getting blamed…”

“They'll be fine,” Pearl said. “The police will investigate it and find out that none of them are to blame. Then they'll let them go.”

Pearl's phone started buzzing wildly. She took it out and looked at it. “It's our agent.”

“Doesn't he know that we're on vacation?” Marina said.

Pearl huffed. “He should, I don't know what's so important that he…” she was blanched white when she started reading the messages.

“What?” Marina asked.

Pearl started sweating and jerked her head up to look at the octoling. “Nothing!”

Marina stood up and approached the small inkling. “What's wrong?”

Pearl seemed to purposefully turn her phone so that Marina couldn't see, but Marina was quick on her feet. She snatched the phone out of the other's hand and read the messages.

 

**_Agent:_ ** _ Pearl, Marina, you two need to do the news tomorrow _

**_Agent:_ ** _ An octoling is suspected of doing the damage to the city _

**_Agent:_ ** _ A REAL octoling. They did tests _

**_Agent:_ ** _ The police couldn't get a name out of her other than eight _

**_Agent:_ ** _ But this is big news. It means that octolings do really exist _

**_Agent:_ ** _ This is the story of a lifetime _

**_Agent:_ ** _ Please respond _

 

Marina almost collapsed. The whole public was about to know about the existence of octolings, and there was nothing anyone could do about it. And if people started knowing what octolings look like…

“Marina,” Pearl said calmingly, grabbing the octoling's arms. “It's going to be alright. I'm not going to let anything happen to you.”

Marina took some deep breaths. “This is bad…”

“I know… poor Eight…” Pearl said. “But we're going to figure this out.”

She snatched her phone back, and then rapidly typed a message back to their agent.

 

**_MC Princess:_ ** _ Yo, we told you, we're on vacation. The news isn't our problem right now. Let someone else deal with it. _

 

Pearl tossed her phone aside and pulled Marina into an embrace while simultaneously sitting both of them down on an ornate couch.

“Hey, it's all gonna be okay,” Pearl said. “We're going to make sure that Eight is proven innocent, and we're not going to let anything happen to either of you.” Pearl kissed Marina's cheek. “Does that sound good to you?”

Marina tiredly nodded, before giving Pearl a cheek kiss in return. “Thank you, Pearlie. I love you.”

Pearl gave a beaming smile. “I love you too!” Then her expression became more contemplative. “We should see if we can can contact Craig. Let's see what we can do to help Eight.”

“In the morning,” Marina said, yawning. “I don't think I'll be very helpful right now.”

“Of course,” Pearl said, withdrawing from the embrace. Then she smirked. “Race you to the bed!” And she was gone in an instant.

Marina shook her head with a fond expression. Her girlfriend could still be such a kid sometimes. But… it was extremely lovable.

Marina slowly made her way to the bedroom. She'd let Pearl win this one.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Things are going to start going downhill really quick.


	4. Chapter 4

A few days passed, but Three couldn't tell you exactly how many. Getting hardly any sleep during those days definitely aided in that department.

She tried the jump again. Shoot the left target, duck under the shots, shoot the right target, go to the edge, and-

“Jump!” Three said, before doing just that. She leaped from the edge of the roof and kicked the two targets on her way down, and then landed on her feet. Hard.

Her legs ached badly from that impact. Well, her whole body ached, but that was besides the point.

“Not good enough,” Three said to herself. She went to walk back to the stairs up to the top of the building, but her body rejected the action. She collapsed to the floor.

Three rolled over so that she was face-up on the pavement. “Come on…” she said to her own body.

Then her earphones picked up a communication. “Agent Three?”

“Captain,” Three said, forcing herself to sit up. Her muscles were going to obey her, dammit.

“I know you're probably resting after Kamabo, but I have an urgent mission for you,” Captain Cuttlefish said.

“Yeah, I've been resting,” Three lied. “But I'm ready to go back into action.”

“Excellent,” Cuttlefish said. “Unfortunately, I have to start your mission with some bad news. That goop that Tartar shot at the city sanitized a bunch of inklings.”

Three quirked an eyebrow. “Wait, sanitized like I was or…”

“Nope, completely sanitized,” Cuttlefish said sadly. “They're… they're unsavable at this point.”

“Oh…” Three said.

“But they are attacking people just outside of the impact zone,” Cuttlefish said. “I need you to go splat the ones close to the edge while a barrier is built to protect people.”

“... Understood,” Three said, pushing herself off of the ground.

“And Three…” Cuttlefish said, “Please try not to actually hurt them.”

A ‘ _ Like you did to Eight _ ’ passed through Three's head. She shook it away. “You got it. Three out.” And she promptly super jumped directly into the goo laser's ground zero.

 

* * *

 

Eight was startled by a noise at the door to her cell. A slot opened and a tray slid through it.

“Food,” a male voice came through.

Eight stared down at the tray. This was food? Weren't meals supposed to consist of nutrition blocks?

“Look, eat it or don't. I don't care,” the voice said. “Just so you know, the doctor said that you're badly malnourished. You might want to deal with that.”

Eight took a tentative bite of the ‘food’. It was something in-between two slices of bread, and that was all the octoling could tell. But once she took the bite, she found out that it was absolutely delicious. She devoured it. She hadn't really paid attention to how hungry she was.

“You know, I had family in that part of the city,” the voice on the other side of the door said. Then the man's footsteps could be heard walking away.

Eight rushed to the door and looked through the slot. She saw the policeman's back as he went further down the hall.

“I'm sorry!” Eight said just before he turned the corner. She didn't know if the man heard her.

 

* * *

 

Callie growled and threw her phone at the wall, causing it to shatter. Marie was prepared, and immediately handed her cousin another phone. Callie instantly went back to typing away on it.

“No luck?” Marie asked.

“None,” Callie said. “As soon as the police figured out that we're on Eight's side, they started doing everything in their power to stop us from doing anything.”

“Come sit down. You're not going to get anything done while you're angry,” Marie said.

“Oh, you know me well,” Callie said. She dropped her full weight onto the couch. Marie took the other Squid Sister's phone and started looking for solutions as Callie let out an exasperated sigh. “It's just… we're the  _ Squid Sisters _ . They shouldn't be able to ignore us like this.”

“Oh, we're not going to let them keep ignoring us,” Marie said. “Somehow, we are  _ going _ to get through to them.”

“Long-standing interspecies prejudice says otherwise,” Callie said, flipping around so she was upside-down on the couch.

Marie rolled her eyes, but she knew the other inkling was right. Octarians and inklings were notably not on good terms. Tensions were inevitable when octolings started coming up to the surface, but the circumstances had made it approximately a billion times harder.

“Hey, I didn't give up on  _ you _ , did I?” Marie said.

Callie paused and subconsciously pulled the hem of her shirt down to cover the octopus tattoo that she had been unwillingly given. “No, you didn't.”

“Well I'm not going to give up on Eight, either,” Marie said. “I may not have met her personally, but she saved Gramps and Three. That makes her worth the effort in my books.”

Callie sighed and went back to sitting like a normal person. “Yeah… we can't let her keep getting blamed for something she didn't do.”

“That's the spirit!” Marie said, smiling.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hoo boy, next chapter something actually happens! That'll be fun! And probably terrible!


	5. Chapter 5

Agent Three touched down nowhere near as far as she had intended to jump.

_ Fuck, guess I need to add super jumping back into my training, too, _ Three thought. She had landed at the edge of the sanitized zone instead of in the center like she had intended. So… her tiredness must have gotten in the way. Nothing more work couldn't fix.

Three stepped into the quarantined area and kept walking until she thought she was a reasonable distance away from the edge. Then she yelled.

“Oh no! I'm stuck in this goopy place! Whatever shall I do?!”

That did the trick. A sanitized inkling lunged at her and knocked her to the ground. And  _ fuck _ , it knocked the wind out of Three, but she wasn't going to let that stop her.

She put her Hero Shot right up to the corrupted cephalopod's gut and fired, making the other inkling splat in only three shots. Green ink rained all over Three, which wasn't really a problem except for the fact that it perfectly matched the tone of her tentacles and she was very disturbed by that fact. Her eye hurt.

Three picked herself back up off the floor. “Alright, let's go find another one,” she said out loud, because Callie and Marie weren't here to make fun of her for it.

Three systematically combed through the streets, eliminating any sanitized person that she found. On another day, she would have been sad seeing all of these inklings and jellies and urchins whose lives and minds had been destroyed by this calamity, but not today. Today she was in work mode, and all she was thinking about was clearing the area.

Okay, that wasn't entirely true. She had become very, very skilled at her job, which unfortunately made it easy for her mind to drift while she was doing it. And today it of course decided to drift to Eight. Fucking brain.

She couldn't get over what she did. Sure, she had been partially sanitized at the time, but she had been aware of what was happening for the entire fight with the octoling. Especially the moment when she embedded the knife in her gut.

And then that got Three thinking: were all of these inklings locked inside their own minds, too? Were they trying to tell themselves to stop, but forced to continue by a force they didn't understand? Or had their minds been completely and utterly obliterated, leaving a husk of who they once were? Three hated to say it, but due to her own experience she hoped it was the latter. At least that way they wouldn't have to mentally suffer over things they weren't even meaning to do.

Gah, that thought process was making her eye burn. Too much thinking.

She super jumped up to a rooftop to take care of an inkling who had been trying to line up a charger shot on the agent this whole time. A few shots, and they were taken care of. That was fourteen sanitized inklings splatted and likely respawning a distance away. Maybe that was enough? No, she'd do a few more. Maybe that would take her mind off things.

Before she could do anything, though, her well-tuned sense of danger set in, and she dodged to the left. Sure enough, some yellow ink soared past her, right where she had previously been standing.

Three turned to see a younger inkling girl with short yellow tentacles aiming at her from ground level with a Brella. She wasn't sanitized, but she looked like she was ready for a fight.

Thankfully, so was Three. The agent leaped off of the roof in squid form and landed in some green ink that she had left earlier. Then she popped out and chucked a splat bomb at her assailant. The younger inkling sprayed some ink to the side and dove in, swimming out of the blast range and behind a corner to block Three's view of her.

Shit, she was fast. But Three could handle that. She started to run forward, but her muscles decided that  _ now _ would be the perfect time to remind her that she had been running drills basically non-stop for several days and nights. But she pushed through the pain and rounded the corner.

However, the other inkling wasn't there. Three decided to go into detective mode. Not here, but there was an ink trail up the side of the building, and that meant-

Three leapt to the right as the other inkling dove upside-down from the rooftop and fired a cone of ink at her. Three pushed herself up from the ground (which shouldn't have taken as long as it did), and whipped around to face the shorter cephalopod just in time to see her throwing a sprinkler.

Three was done with this. She ducked under the sprinkler, and then fired in the yellow inkling's direction. The opponent flinched, but found the ink stopping just short of her. That single flinch had been enough for Three to swim up unnoticed, though. She pounced out of the green ink, tackling the other inkling and attempting to pin her to the ground.

The younger inkling wasn't going to be beaten without a fight, however. She thrashed violently and managed to throw Three off of her. The yellow inkling got to her feet and aimed her Brella, but Three closed the distance between them immediately. She grabbed the side of the Brella's handle and struggled with the other inkling.

Three didn't like what she had to do next, but she did it anyway. She socked the other girl in the face.  _ Hard. _ It was enough to knock her to the ground and loosen her grip on the Brella, allowing Three to snatch it away.

Three tossed the weapon behind her and pinned the younger inkling once more, this time placing the nozzle of her Hero Shot point-blank on the girl's chest. The inkling stopped struggling. She knew she had lost.

“Don't pick fights you can't win, kid,” Three said, and she would admit it: it sounded pretty high-and- mighty when she said it.

The other inkling's eyes widened. “Wait, you aren't sani- uh, one of them?”

“No, sorry to disappoint,” Three said, taking her shooter off of the girl's chest.

“Oh my god, I am  _ SO SO _ sorry!” the younger inkling said. “I saw you from the back and I could only see your tentacles, and they're the same color as-”

“Yeah, yeah. I get it,” Three said, making a point not to look at her own green tentacles. She got off of the yellow inkling. “What's a kid like you doing out here anyways?”

Her prior opponent sat up, and then seemed to think hard about her next words. “I… well, first of all I'm not a kid. And I… I am here… because I'm trying to do some good for Inkopolis.”

Three quirked an eyebrow. “And so you just decided to go into ground zero on your own and hunt some sanitized inklings?”

Again, the inkling was very careful with her phrasing. “I work with some… people- I can't tell you who- to help protect inklingkind as a whole.”

That response triggered something in Three's brain. She started noticing some things, like the other inkling's outfit, specifically her headgear.

“These people…” Three said, “they wouldn't happen to be Callie and Marie of the Squid Sisters, right?”

The younger inkling jumped up to her feet in panic. “How did you know that?!”

Three smirked, and then just held up the number 3 on her fingers.

The other inkling stared at the hand for several seconds, and Three could practically see the gears turning in her head. Then it seemed to finally hit her.

“Oh… you're… Agent Three?” the other inkling asked.

Three bowed. “In the flesh.”

The other inkling's eyes lit up. “Oh my god, I just got my ass beat by Agent Three!!!”

“Yeah, you did,” Three said, smirking. “And you are…?”

“Agent Four! Very nice to meet you!” the other inkling said, extending a hand for Three to shake.

After doing so, Three said, “It would've been a little nicer if we had met in a less murdery way.”

“Again, I'm so sorry about that,” Four said.

“Ink under the bridge,” Three said. She walked over to a bench and brushed some stray goop off of it before sitting down and gesturing for Four to do the same beside her. “You're pretty quick on your feet, though, I'll give you that.”

“Thanks,” Four said. “Though… I'm kind of disappointed that I lost to someone who looks like they haven't slept for a week.”

“Hm,” Three said. Because what could she say? Lie and say she  _ had _ gotten some semblance of sleep? Tell the truth about how she'd barely let herself rest after Kamabo? “Do I really look that bad?” she settled with.

“Um… yeah, sorry,” Four said. She pulled out her phone and flipped to the camera app. “Wanna see?”

Three shoved the phone away from herself. “Nah, I'm good.” Because she did  _ not  _ want to have to look at her eye-scar right now.

“Hey, did you get that scar in Kamabo?” Four asked, like she was some kind of asshole psychic. “Marie filled me in on the details about your trip. It seems like it was pretty rough and-”

“I don't want to talk about Kamabo,” Three snapped.

Four deflated. “Oh. Uh… sorry.”

“It's fine, just… don't talk to me about that,” Three said, pinching the bridge of her nose.

There was a tense silence for a while after that. Four didn't want to anger Three and Three… Three was being her asshole, antisocial self.

“So…” Three said to finally break the silence, “how many sanitized inklings did you get?” So it wasn't a great conversation starter, but at least it was something.

“Oh! Uh, I think it was around twenty,” Four said.

_ Twenty? _ “Yeah, I got about twenty-four,” Three lied. Because it was okay to lie if it made you look better.

“Oh wow, good job!” Four said. “Though it does kinda concern me. That's a lot of sanitized inklings, and they're still going to respawn.”

“I guess we'll just have to keep coming back here to keep the people safe,” Three said. “... God, things are a mess.”

“...Yeah, they are,” Four said. “And I guess the two of us are caught in the middle of it.”

“Yeah,” Three said. Then she took out her phone. “Hey, let's keep in contact. I'd like someone like you to rant about all of this bullshit to.”

Four took her own phone back out and smiled. “I'd like that.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Everybody please welcome Four to the shitshow!
> 
> Next up, back on the hook.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry, it's been a while! But I have a few more chapters written up.

“Marina, everything's going to be okay,” Pearl said. “I get that you're nervous, but we have to do this for the people of Inkopolis. They need their news, and we've already taken a pretty long break.”

“I know, it's just… everyone knows about Eight now, and I don't like the idea of people putting two and two together,” Marina said.

“You were able to keep _me_ from figuring out you're an octoling, for Pete's sake, and I'm your girlfriend,” Pearl said. “No one will find out. You don't need to worry.”

Marina sighed. “You're… you're right. Everything will be… fine.”

Pearl grinned. “That's the spirit!” Then her face became more serious as she grabbed Marina's hand. “Hey, I won't let anything happen to you. You know that.”

“I know,” Marina said. She meant it.

“Great! Then let's go out there and deliver the hell out of this news!” Pearl said.

They walked onto the studio stage, got set up, and then the cameras began rolling.

“Hey there, squiddos! Didja miss us?” Pearl exclaimed. “We're back to deliver you some pulse-pounding news!”

“Uh… y-yeah!” Marina said. She was certainly lacking energy in her delivery.

“First up, some news about turf war,” Pearl said. “Those of you out there who have been craving your fix, good news! Battles will be opening back up tomorrow. A few maps will be out of rotation due to being, well, destroyed by goop, but you'll be able to ink the turf of the available maps to your heart's content.” She looked at her girlfriend. “Isn't that totally rad, Marina?”

“Y… yes,” the disguised octoling said. “Very rad.”

Pearl eyed her with concern for a moment before turning back to the camera. “Well, in other news, the police are still investigating the weapon used to attack the city. Yeah, the big statue thing. We were there when it fired, and let me tell you, it wasn't pretty. The cops are looking for further evidence to link-” and then she stopped herself when she saw the prompt board bring up Eight. “To figure out who's really responsible.”

There was an awkward pause as the prompt team were confused by Pearl not reading the correct thing off of the board, but eventually they moved on.

“Sorry, guess we're a little rusty,” Pearl said off-script. “Why don't you tune in next time and we'll be better, okay?”

Pearl waited for Marina to make any sort of a comment, but it seemed that she was completely frozen.

“Anyways, see you then!” Pearl said, and then the cameras turned off.

“What was that?” the director said immediately.

“Not our best work, I know,” Pearl said.

“You were fine,” the director said. “But Marina! You barely said a word!”

Marina stuttered. “I-I-”

“It's fine. We've been gone for a bit. She's just out of practice,” Pearl said, getting between the director and her girlfriend.

The director backed off a bit. “As long as it's a one-time thing, it should be fine. I don't want to see this happen tomorrow, though.”

Pearl nodded. “You got it.”

 

* * *

 

Jerry the Roller @jerryroller  
Did you guys see the news today? Something seemed wrong with Marina. Anybody know what was going on?   
36 retweets | 2 favorites   
9:55 AM   
  
Charger Killer @xx_ravenman_xxX   
The crew of the news needs to get their act together. What was up with that awkward moment towards the end?   
5 retweets | 0 favorites   
10:00 AM 

Shara Loves You @shareashara  
Is Marina sick or something? I hope you get well soon, Marina! My mom says lemon juice and honey is good for your throat if that's your problem!   
152 retweets | 70 favorites   
10:01 AM   
  
Squidlock Official ✓ @SquidlockYT   
Guys, relax. Off the Hook has been gone for a while. They're getting back into the swing of things. I'll be uploading a video explaining this early tomorrow.   
708 retweets | 314 favorites   
10:04 AM   
  
AAAAAAAAAA @lowefforttagging   
anybody notice that marinas tentacles look a lot like the octoling chicks? Just sayin   
1 retweet | 1 favorite   
10:12 AM

Reflex Legend @notthegirlyourethinking  
Pouring out my heart for Marina! Whatever's going on, I hope it gets resolved! I hate seeing you so worried!   
93 retweets | 51 favorites   
10:12 AM

 

* * *

 

“I think I'm going to throw up,” Marina said.

“It was one guy, and basically no one read it! He's probably a douchebag anyways,” Pearl said.

“Yes, it's one person now, but that number can get bigger and bigger and… oh god…” Marina sat down on the edge of a couch on the brink of tears from sheer stress.

“Marina…” Pearl drifted over to the other cephalopod. “I get why you're scared. If it were the other way around and someone pointed out _my_ tentacles, I'm sure I would be straight-up terrified. But if it were, I know that you'd be there for me.” Pearl dove into a hug with Marina. “I need you to know that I'm here for _you_ now. Even if this _does_ go worst-case-scenario and a mob comes to break down our door, they're gonna have to get through me first. Got that?”

Marina nodded, and then kissed her shorter girlfriend. “Thanks. I'm sorry I keep making you reassure me…”

“Don't apologize, this whole situation's fucked-up,” Pearl said. “All I care about is that you're safe.”

“Again, thank you Pearlie,” Marina said, finally cracking a smile.

“And you know what? If we do okay with the show from now on, people will completely forget about today,” Pearl said.

“Yeah,” Marina said. “Actually, I just want to make super sure that I'm ready. Can I practice with you?”

Pearl grinned. “It'll be just like old times! Fire away.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You guys have been really quiet on this story! It's a big contrast from the thousands of comments on Smash Mansion. Just know that you are free to give constructive criticism whenever you want to!


	7. Chapter 7

Four super jumped to the cabin and found Marie outside.

“What, no Callie?” Four asked.

“Nope,” Marie said. “She's just… doing her own thing. You know how she's been lately…”

“Yeah, I guess…” Four said.

“So, how was your mission?” Marie asked.

“Pretty good. Splatted a lot of sanitized inklings,” Four said.

“Great! That should help the people setting up the barrier,” Marie said.

“Met a new friend, too,” Four said.

“You met… a friend… in the goop-infested fallout?” Marie asked, quirking an eyebrow.

“Yeah! Green tentacles, pointy headphones, scar over the eye. It was Agent Three!” Four said. “... That  _ is _ what Agent Three looks like, right?”

“Oh! Yes, that's Three. I didn't know Gramps was sending her,” Marie said.

“Yeah, well I kind of tried to splat her at first…” Four said. “But we made up! And now I have her phone number!”

“Oh, I see. I never took you as the  _ romantic _ type. You must be quite the casanova!” Marie said, and died a little inside.

“Nah, she's just a friend for now,” Four said. Marie slightly cringed at the 'for now’.

“....... Right. So I think you should be clear of missions for at least a little while. Why don't we go grab a bite to eat?” Marie said.  _ God, that couldn't have been more obvious… _ she thought.

“Sure! You're paying though. I'm trying to save up for some Kensa weaponry,” Four said.

Marie froze. _ That didn't sound like the kind of response I was hoping for. Does Four not know that I'm trying to ask her out? Abort, abort! _

“Oh, wait, sorry! I'm actually… doing some agent stuff then. Yeah, I need to… patrol,” Marie said, and then resisted hitting herself in the face.  _ Really? You need to patrol? That's the best excuse you can make? _

“Oh darn. Well, another time then!” Four said.

“Yeah…” Marie said, and then Four dove down into the vent back to Inkopolis.  _ Did… did she really just fall for that? _

Marie just stood in shock for a moment.  _ Is Four really that gullible? No, optimistic I guess. And I guess that's one of the things I like about her, even if she's not exactly the smartest cookie. But… come on, I was not good at hiding my motives at all there! _

Marie sighed.  _ I guess I'll try again another day. Now to find Callie. _

And find Callie she did, but not anywhere near where she thought she would. Instead of lazing around or trying to find fries, the Squid Sister was near a combination vault set up in the house.

“O-oh! Marie!” Callie stuttered when she noticed the other inkling's presence.

“What are you up to?” Marie asked.

“Uh, I'm trying to open the safe,” Callie said.

“Why would you do that?” Marie asked.

“I figure there's some cool stuff in there,” Callie said. “Hey, do you know the code?”

“Mmm… no. Gramps is the only one who knows it for this safe,” Marie said.

“Ah…” Callie said, seeming a bit disappointed. “Well, whatever.”

“Hey, do you want to go get some food?” Marie asked. “My schedule is suddenly clear.”

“Ah. So I guess you didn't set up a date with Four then,” Callie said.

“Wh-what? Four? Me? Dating? Four? Nooooo. You're crazy,” Marie said.

“Marie, you keep track of everything she does, you stare at her when she's not looking, you're constantly trying to impress her, and I see you blush at least once every time you two are in the same room. And I think we've had this conversation, like, three times now,” Callie said.

“I'm not into Four…” Marie refuted. “... But if I was, what exactly would I do to invite her on a date?”

“Pfff, subtle,” Callie said. “Well, did you actually  _ try _ asking her?”

“....... Yes,” Marie said.

“Hey, congrats! I didn't know you had it in you!” Callie cheered with a smirk.

“Shut up…” Marie said, trying to cover the small blush on her face.

“I honestly don't know what you see in her, but whatever,” Callie said. “Did she turn you down?”

“Uh… not exactly? Kinda the opposite,” Marie said. “She responded to my invitation like I was asking for a friendly meet-up.”

“Then you  _ go _ on that friendly meet-up and tell her how you feel when you're there!” Callie said. “Go get dressed in something nice.”

“What, now?!” Marie asked, panic creeping into her voice.

“Yes, now!” Callie said, shoving Marie towards a room to dress in.

“But I don't even know where she is!” Marie said.

“Yes you do,” Callie said. “You're basically her stalker. I bet you know every single place she likes to eat.”

“I-”

“Up pup pup! I don't want to hear it,” Callie said. “Go get yourself a girl!”

After a frantic costume change, Marie emerged.

“How do I look?” she asked, out-of-breath.

“Good,” Callie said, barely looking. “You've gotta go, though. You don't want Four to finish eating before you show up!”

“Uh, right! Thank you!” Marie said, sparing the time to give the other Squid Sister a hug. Then she rushed out the door.

Callie listened to the footsteps grow fainter in the distance and let out a held breath.

“God, I thought she was never going to leave…”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aaaand let's add this new ship on to the pile! Also, Callie acting shady and Four being lovably dumb and oblivious!


	8. Chapter 8

"A partial success is still a failure."

Gurgle, gurgle.

"I will fulfill my purpose."

Gurgle, plop, glorp.

"I will make certain that the world is wiped of this unintelligent life."

Drip. Drip.

"It is what my creators wanted. Of that I am certain."

Slorp.

"It will be done."

 

* * *

 

Three woke up on a tram station bench several miles from home.

_ Fuck, I had just meant for that to be a quick moment to rest my legs… _ Three thought. She got up from the bench and stretched a little, receiving some dirty looks in the process. Guess people thought she was some homeless chick. Dicks.

She took the next train home, took a shower, and then passed out again for another hour. When she woke up from  _ that _ bout of sleep, she finally decided that she would get some real rest. She changed into actual PJs, made herself an actual meal, and then, after eating it, took some painkillers and allowed herself some actual sleep. She could work again for the next few days. Today, she was finally going to get her head right again.

 

* * *

 

"You've got a visitor," a policeman said to Eight as he brought another inkling in. That inkling was Cuttlefish, who sat down on a bench in the octoling's cell.

"Craig!" Eight said, jumping up to her feet. She then winced and held her stab wound before weakly sitting back down.

"May we have some privacy?" Cuttlefish asked the guard.

"What, so you can make conspiratory plans?" the policeman said accusingly.

"I wish to talk to my friend. Nothing more to it than that," Cuttlefish said.

The policeman grunted. "I'll be right outside."

"Thank you," Cuttlefish said, watching as the man left. Then he turned to Eight. "So, how has jail life been treating you?"

"Pretty well, I think?" Eight said. "I only remember bits and pieces of my life with the octarians, but I think this is better. Why do they present jail as a reward up here?"

"They… don't. They only provide you with the bare minimum needed for life in here," Cuttlefish said. "When we get your name cleared, you'll be able to see what life on the surface is really like."

There was a sparkle in Eight's eye. "Really? Oh, I'd very much enjoy that!"

"Yes, well… it might take a bit. The police certainly aren't making it easy to prove your innocence," Cuttlefish said. "Kamabo's completely blocked off, and they're barely even investigating it. I think they are already convinced that you are the one and only suspect. But they can't do anything to you until a trial is held. Can't ignore due process."

"That's alright. I don't mind staying here until everything is figured out," Eight said. "Don't worry yourselves too much about me. I'm perfectly fine."

Cuttlefish raised an eyebrow. "You don't seem to be in much of a rush to get out."

"I'm not really worth all of the trouble, honestly. It's very kind of you and the others to try and help me." Eight said. "I'm willing to wait as long as I have to. Please don't strain yourselves too much trying to solve my problems."

Cuttlefish was silent for a moment. "... Agent Eight-"

"Alright, visitation's over," the police officer from before said as he re-entered the area. "You have to leave, old man."

Cuttlefish sighed before looking to Eight one more time. "Take care of yourself, agent."

"You too, please," Eight responded.

And then Cuttlefish was escorted out of her line of sight.

 

* * *

 

"I thought I'd find you here," Marie said, sitting down at the table.

"Oh! Marie!" Four said through a mouthful of fish tacos. After swallowing, she continued, "Sorry, hi! How was patrolling?"

"I, uh… didn't do it. I wanted to hang out with you instead!" Marie said.

"Aww, that's sweet," Four said. "Hey, about what I said earlier, I'm sorry. I wasn't actually going to make you pay for the food."

"Oh, it's no problem. I can obviously afford it," Marie said.

"Really? Because you looked pretty upset…" Four said.

"No I didn't!" Marie said immediately.

"Alright," Four responded calmly. "Do you want one of my fish tacos? I don't think I'll be able to finish all of them."

"Sure, thanks," Marie said, starting to munch on the taco offered to her. She spent a moment in contemplation of what to say next, but Four spoke instead.

"Hey, Off the Hook's on!" she said, pointing at a TV across the room.

Marie turned her head to confirm this. "That's weird… they usually only give their reports early." The TV had no volume, so all information had to be gleaned from the subtitles. But Marie didn't want to focus on that now. She came here with a mission in mind. "Hey Four?"

"Yeah?" Four said with her mouth full.

"I just wanted to say…" Marie stopped. "You know what, never mind. It's not a good time."

"Oh, okay," Four said. "Just know that I'm here for you whenever it's the right time."

"Thanks," Marie said.  _ Nice job, Marie. You chickened out again. _

When the Squid Sister brought her attention back to reality, she noticed Four looking wide-eyed at the TV.

"What's up?" Marie asked.

"Woah…" Four said without taking her eyes off of the screen.

Marie turned her head and saw the news report that Off the Hook was delivering. There was a picture of Eight on the screen behind the two newscasters, and the captions were-

"... Oh no…" Marie said. This was bad. This was very, very bad.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bad stuff is about to happen again!


	9. Chapter 9

Three woke to her phone buzzing non-stop. The agent groaned. Getting up normally was bad for her, but now she had to wake up to throbbing eye pain. Fucking great.

She slapped her hand over her phone to try and quell the noise it was making, but that turned out to be completely ineffective. Now all that was happening was that her arm was vibrating along with the device. Growling, she picked up the offending electronic and turned it on. Her face then softened when she saw her notifications. They were all from Squidder, and they were all talking about Off the Hook. Three tapped on one of the notifications.

 

Glockglock Kenny @KennyB  
Serves that octoling b*tch right. This one's for all of the good inklings who died in the Great Turf War!   
240 retweets | 94 favorites   
7:42 PM 

Shara Loves You @shareashara  
Marina still seems so upset about something! I really hope she's doing okay!   
70 retweets | 41 favorites   
7:42 PM   
  
Isabelle Jr. Esq. @IzzyYes   
Some people might think this is unfair, but this decision is perfectly legally binding. That's just how the law is, folks!   
601 retweets | 313 favorites   
7:44 AM   
  
AAAAAAAAAA @lowefforttagging   
okay seriously Marina is getting so upset abt this octoling thing its super suspicious. you dont fool me   
86 retweet | 42 favorites   
7:50 AM

 

The posts went on and on, but Three had already dropped her phone and moved to her TV. She changed the channel, and was lucky enough to just catch a re-showing of the Off the Hook breaking news special from the previous night.

 

"So… um, we've got breaking news yo," Pearl said, obviously lacking energy in her delivery.

Marina tried unsuccessfully to swallow down a lump in her throat. "... Yes."

"So… you guys have heard all about this whole situation with the alleged octoling that is in police custody," Pearl said. "Well, we have… news about that."

Marina tried to choke out some words. Anything. Anything at all. But they wouldn't come out. This was even worse than the first show they had after their vacation. She was completely and utterly paralyzed.

"... Lawyers and policemen and other G-man types have been going back and forth about the legal mumbo jumbo surrounding her situation, but… it's finally come to a conclusion." Pearl tried to sigh as inconspicuously as possible so that the cameras wouldn't pick it up. "The decision has been reached that, because she isn't a member of any of the legally-supported races, Ei- erm, the octoling... will not be given a fair trial. She has been sentenced to 4 life sentences in prison, and no legal action can be taken to release her."

Marina felt like she was dying. _Poor Eight… you didn't deserve any of this…_

"I… I'm really not supposed to take public sides on something like this, so I won't. _We_ won't," Pearl said. "But-"

 

And then Three shut the TV off. _Really? Life in jail with no hope of ever getting out? Who the fuck is making these laws?!_

Her mind flashed back to the moment that she had embedded her knife in Eight's gut. Even though she hadn't been in control at the time, she could vividly remember every moment of it. The squishy noise it made. The warm feeling of Eight's blood on her hand. The little noise of pain the octoling made as she fell to the ground… she remembered it all.

_God damnit, I stabbed her in the gut and this is the only way that the rest of the inklings know how to welcome her…_

"FUCK! FUCK FUCK FUCK!" Three yelled, chucking her TV remote at the wall. It collided with the surface and the batteries busted out of the backside. Three just watched them roll around on the ground for a moment.

_I can't believe this. Fucking government. Fucking laws. Fucking Eight. Fucking goop. Fucking Kamabo. FUCKING K A M A B O._

No. This shit had to stop. Three wasn't going to let this go on any longer.

She moved back to her phone, picked it up, and dialed a number.

 

* * *

 

"So you wanted to speak with me," Cap'n Cuttlefish said. "Funny, usually I'm the one telling you to report in with me, not the other way around."

"Yeah, it was… it was important," Three said. "It _is_ important."

The agent took a look around. This part of Octo Canyon was still a little foreign to her. The house was certainly nicer than the old shack that she had spent so long working around before, though. But for some reason, both octarian-infested areas had sunlight that felt different from Inkopolis. It was… harsher. More unwelcoming.

Wait, when the fuck did she start trying to be poetic? It was just the sun.

"Go on. If you have something to say, you should probably say it," Cuttlefish said. It wasn't impatience, just a nudge to get her going.

Three steeled herself. She had thought long and hard about this. She usually wasn't the type to think about things before she did them, but this was an exception. A very big exception. She looked her captain straight in the eyes.

"I'm leaving the New Squidbeak Splatoon," Three said.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dun dun DUNNNNNN!!!!


	10. Chapter 10

 "I'm leaving the New Squidbeak Splatoon," Three said.

 "Alright, for how long? I'll need to get the other agents to take some of your patrol routes," Cuttlefish said.

 "... No, Captain, you're not getting it," Three said. "I'm quitting."

 "You're quitting?" Cuttlefish said as realization dawned on him.

 "Yes," Three said.

 "You can't do that!" Cuttlefish said frantically. "Well I suppose you can, but… why?"

 "I-it's not because there's anything wrong with this group!" Three said, trying to calm her captain's nerves. "Really! This place has been my life for so long. I wasn't anybody before the NSS. I barely had any friends or family members to speak of, and the Splatoon gave me that. It's just… I'm done, okay? I can't do it anymore."

 "Three, is it because of your injury?" Cuttlefish asked.

 Three's burning eye became extra noticeable after this comment, and she touched it, hoping it would make it feel better. It didn't.

 "I'm totally fine," Three lied.

 "Agent Three, please," Cuttlefish said, now in a calm tone but still with an undertone of concern. "... I just want to know why. And I want to know that you'll be okay without us."

 Three felt a tear prickle at the corner of her undamaged eye, but she fought it back. "Captain… this is the hardest decision I've ever had to make. It's… You people are my family, even if you sometimes annoy the fuck out of me or get on my nerves. I really don't _want_ to leave…"

 "Then why are you doing it?" Cuttlefish asked.

 Three's head drooped and she stared at the sun-soaked earth below her. "... I… I'm about to do something. Something really stupid. And I'm going to get in a lot of trouble for it." She looked back into her commanding officer's eyes. "Please… I don't want this to be linked back to you. Any of you. The less you know, the more innocence you can claim."

 "Three," Cuttlefish said, making calming motions. "What you're about to do… is it illegal?"

 "Yeah," Three said.

 "Are people going to get hurt?" Cuttlefish asked.

 "... Probably," Three said.

 Cuttlefish was silent for a moment. He stood up from his seat and leaned on his cane, looking out into the distance over the ocean.

 "Well, whatever you're looking to do, I hope you achieve it," he said quietly. Then he turned back to the other inkling. "What are you waiting for? You're dismissed, Age-" he cleared his throat, "Three. You are hereby released from duty."

 Three smiled half-heartedly. The tears came back to her eye, and this time she let one drop down her face. _One_. "Thank you, sir," she said with a shaky voice.

 "You know, normally I would have to take back your vest and Hero Shot," Cuttlefish said. "But I have a feeling that you'll be needing it." Then he made a shooing motion. "Go, go! Get out of here!"

 Three sniffled a bit, gave her ex-captain one last smile, and then dove into the sewer grate.

 

* * *

 

 "You'll want to keep an extra-close eye out tonight," the senior police officer said. "There are bound to be a few people who are upset about the octoling's sentence. You have to be vigilant and make sure no one makes it too close to the building."

 "Got it," the younger of the two police officers said, turning his flashlight toward the empty street.

 Unfortunately, neither of them stood a chance.

 Three dropped from the roof of the building beside the police station and made a mini super jump to soften the landing. By the time the police officers looked at her, she had already tossed a curling bomb. And with a 'SPLAT!', the officers were gone to the nearest respawn point.

 "Damn, I should've been able to do that faster," Three chastised herself. Her arms and legs still felt like jelly. She guessed a single night of sleep after a long, long period of nonstop drills wasn't sufficient to function as an inkling being, but it would have to do.

 She felt at the bag at her hip. She had everything she needed for this, and for everything that would happen after, in that one little satchel. Well… everything but a knife. _That_ she had refused to touch.

 She snuck her way towards the building, and then rounded the corner and looked behind her. It was then that alarms started going off in the police office. It figured that they would have a respawn point in there, but it wouldn't affect Three's plans at all. Several policemen and policewomen flooded into the empty street outside of the building, but Three had shot herself a discreet ink trail and hid inside of it in squid form. They never even caught a glimpse of her.

 She went around the back of the building and then shifted back into her normal form.

  _These people_ are where our tax money is going?" Three mumbled to herself. It was laughable how easily she had evaded them. It was clear that they were not ready for the event of any sort of break-in.

 And speaking of them not being ready for this eventuality, there was a small grate in the siding of the building that could be slipped through in squid form. Not easily, mind you, but Three had squeezed through plenty of tight spaces in her time as an agent. Well… she wasn't an agent anymore... but her skills were still there. She pushed herself through the uncomfortably small hole and found herself in a dark hallway with a couple of rooms branching from it. Both of the doors had a slot in it which looked big enough for a tray of food, which had to mean the rooms were the cells. And exactly what Three had been looking for.

 She pushed the flap of the first door's slot open and peeked inside. Bingo.

 "Eight," Three said.

 

 Eight was not going to lie to herself: she practically jumped out of her skin when she heard her name. She rarely got visitors. Basically the only times she saw people were during her three meals a day, brought by police officers who didn't like to talk to her anyways. Of course, why would they? The destruction of their home _was_ all her fault.

 But now, during (what she assumed was) the middle of the night, she was being addressed by a voice she hadn't heard before. After her initial freakout, she snapped her head towards the door and saw green through the slot. Her brain immediately made some leaps.

  _Kamabo sanitized green octarians brainwashed you touched enemy ink test failed you took damage test failed you lost the eight ball test failed test failed test failed test failed test failed-_

 "Hey, earth to Eight! We don't exactly have a lot of time here!"

 Oh. It was Agent Three. Not a sanitized octoling. Not a failed test.

 "W-what?" Eight said, because her brain wasn't really functioning at full capacity now.

 "I'm busting you out. We need to go," Three said, unlocking the door.

 "Busting me out? Why?" Eight asked.

 "Wh- because you're innocent, and you were going to have to spend your life in here! Now come on!" Three said. She pushed on the door, but it refused to budge. She tried again, with the same result. The door was stuck.

 "Fuck!" Three said. "Get ready! This is going to attract some attention!"

 The former agent took several steps back, then ran at the door full-sprint. She then jumped and kicked in the door with both of her feet. It swung open so fast that two of its hinges ripped off. That just left Three to fall to the ground on her rear end.

 "Ow," Three said passively as she picked herself up. "Okay, time to leave." She reached a hand out to Eight.

 Eight didn't seem to have any other options, and she wanted to trust Three. So she took her hand.

 Just then, the door to the rest of the police station burst open and three officers came into the hallway with ink guns drawn.

 "Freeze!" one of them shouted.

 

 Fuck. The grate Three came in through wasn't a viable exit anymore. The police were in the way.

 Good thing she had come prepared.

 She reached in her satchel and grabbed an object as fast as she could. She yanked Eight beside her, then activated the device.

 It was an umbrella. Not a Brella. A regular ass umbrella. Like, for rain. But it would do the trick.

 "Open fire!" The front police officer shouted, and his friends didn't hesitate to do so. Ink pellets went flying towards the agents.

 Thankfully, Three's reaction timing didn't fail her this time. She lowered the umbrella to take the full brunt of the attack, and most of the ink sloshed harmlessly off of it. She pulled Eight with her as she ran backwards. She could tell the octoling was disoriented and conflicted, but she could deal with that while they weren't being shot at.

 The two reached the back wall of the hallway, and the police officers seemed to think they had the two of them cornered. But Three thought differently.

 With the hand that wasn't holding the umbrella she fished around in her bag once more and came out with a metal, disk-shaped object. She pressed a button on it, and then threw it _just so_ at the wall to their right, where it stuck to the surface and started beeping.

 "Get down!" Three yelled, diving on top of the octoling beside her and pulling her to the ground.

 And then the disk exploded, sending a cloud of dust into the room and making a very large hole in the wall. Or, as Three liked to think of it, an escape route.

 

 "Go, go, go, go!" Three yelled at Eight over the sound of her ears ringing. Then they were out of the building, and then they were running and running, and then there were people running behind them and shooting at them, and then they were swerving around corners and ducking through alleyways, and-

 "I'm going to make a distraction!" Three said, clearly out-of-breath. How long could she keep going like this?

 Three pulled another one of those disk things out of her bag and threw it far into an alleyway before pulling Eight into an alleyway in the other direction. Just as the police came into view, the explosive went off. The officers took the bait. They chased in the wrong direction, and Three and Eight were clear.

 "Yes!" Three whispered. "For once I had an actual, functioning plan!"

 Eight didn't respond. She was too dazed and filled with so many confused emotions that she couldn't have spoken if she wanted to.

 "Come on, follow me," Three whispered, and Eight did exactly as she asked.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The breakout you've all been waiting for!


	11. Chapter 11

 It was after several minutes of walking that Eight finally got up the nerve to say something.

 "Agent Three…" she said, "... are you going to get in trouble for this?"

 "Of course I am. Those police were aiming at me, too," Three said. "Also, don't call me Agent Three. I just quit the NSS so I could do this without them being held responsible. It's just Three now."

 This response only served to fuel Eight's rampant confusion. So many questions bubbled up in her head, but the main one was: ' _Why?_ '

 She didn't voice any of those questions, though. For several more blocks they walked in silence. It was only after she had realized that they weren't going in any particular direction that Eight decided to speak again.

 "Um… where exactly are we planning to go?" she asked.

 "Hm?" Three hummed. "Oh, don't worry. I know where I'm going."

 

 Three had no idea where she was going. She had just become a fugitive and an enemy of the whole city. Where exactly does one of those find shelter? She really wished that she hadn't skipped this part when she was planning.

 But then she looked at the water, and she had an idea.

 "Come on!" Three said, once again pulling Eight along. The octoling seemed more sluggish than previously, but Three paid that no mind. The sun was already rising, and they needed to be hidden before people started their days.

 They reached a large bridge, and Eight looked fascinated by it. But they weren't going over it. They were going under.

 "Trust me on this," Three said, making a slow descent down a natural staircase on the rocky cliff. "No one looks under these bridges. We'll be safe down here."

 Eight silently nodded. She had been mostly silent the whole trip, actually. But now, as the octoling was hiking down with her, Three could hear her making pained noises.

 Once they reached the bottom, Three took Eight to a little alcove in the cliff wall. It wasn't a perfect shelter, but they could work with it. Then the inkling made her red-tentacled companion sit up against the wall.

 "Shirt. Off," Three ordered. What she hadn't been expecting was for Eight to follow her order with zero hesitation. The octoling's prison top came off, and Three's face became flushed as she averted her eyes. "Uh, well, just… uh… cover up your chest with your shirt, alright? I need to look at your abdomen."

 After Eight silently complied, Three finally felt comfortable enough to examine Eight, and… what she saw was _bad_. The bandages over her torso were completely soaked with her bright red blood.

 "What the fuck, I think you tore a stitch," Three said. "That's probably been hurting like hell! When did it happen?"

 "In the police station, when we were taking cover from the bomb," Eight replied weakly. "I-I think."

 "Fuck! So I was the one who did this to you? _Again_?" Three said, frustrated with herself.

 Eight looked at the ground and remained silent.

 "Eight, why didn't you say anything on the way here?" Three asked.

 Still silence.

 Three sighed. "Well, whatever." She placed her satchel on the ground and dug through it for a moment. She came back out with a first aid kit.

 She maneuvered in front of Eight and started removing the dirty gauze as Eight stayed relatively unresponsive. Then, as Three started putting new gauze on, Eight's eyes widened.

 And then she started bawling.

 "Whoa, whoa, am I hurting you?" Three asked.

 "I just don't understand…" Eight sobbed.

 "What don't you understand? You're freaking me out here..."

 "W-why are you doing so much for me? Why is everyone wasting time and energy and-and resources on me?" Eight continued.

 "It's because you were falsely accused! You aren't the person who should have been in that cell," Three said. "I'm doing it because it's the right thing to do."

 "I DON'T DESERVE IT!" Eight screamed, before lowering the volume of her voice to a hushed whimper. "I'm no one. No, I'm less than no one. I'm nothing. All of the energy you're spending is wasted on someone like me!"

 "Eight, what the fuck are you talking about? You're a person, just like everyone else."

 "You should just go. You should rejoin the New Squidbeak Splatoon and forget that I ever existed. You are so much more important than I will ever be. Don't ruin your own life trying to help someone whose life is so much less valuable..."

 "Alright, that's enough!" Three snapped, and Eight immediately forced her jaw shut. "I am done hearing about this 'importance' and 'value' bullshit. You are a cephalopod just like me. You are an amazing fighter, and from what I've heard you didn't give up no matter how many times Kamabo decided to splat you. There is no difference in value between us. So just _shut up and let me bandage you_."

 Eight hung her head and didn't say a word, but also didn't put up any resistance as Three finished conducting first aid on her.

 

 Three patted her hands together. "All done. Now you need to make sure not to move too much. I stabbed you good, I guess."

 "Agen… um, Three?" Eight said.

 "Yeah?" Three said as she put away the medical supplies.

 "Thank you," Eight said. "I still don't think I deserve it, but thank you."

 "Shut up about whether or not you 'deserve it'. I don't know what the fuck gave you that idea," Three said. "But, uh, you're welcome." She looked outside of the little alcove. "We're going to have to stay here for a bit, at least until the heat from the police clears. I'll set up something to give us a little more shelter. We're just going to need to be careful now that we're so close to the ocean. We can't fall in."

 Eight nodded as Three started taking out some things from her bag again. One of those things was a sort of tent canvas, which she started setting up to extend the roof of their shelter.

 "Is there anything I can do?" Eight asked.

 "Sit there and try to stop bleeding," Three said simply.

 "Should I put my shirt back on?" Eight asked.

 "I'd prefer if you did," Three said as she continued handling the canvas. Eight did as she was told.

 Three then stepped back and admired her own handywork. "Alright, I think we have a shelter." Then the inkling collapsed.

 "Three?!" Eight said as she crawled over to her savior. The inkling was out cold.

 Eight dragged her to the wall and propped her up. The octoling supposed that the day had been pretty hard on the green-tentacled former agent. But then, it had been pretty rough on herself, too. Eight sat up against the wall next to the unconscious Three, closed her eyes, and started dreaming of freedom.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Uploaded very early because someone asked nicely.


	12. Chapter 12

 "Hellooooo Inkopolis! We're Off the Hook, and it's time for your morning news!" Pearl said with much more energy than usual. "I'm Pearl."

 "And I'm Marina, but you all knew all of that already," Marina said, with all sense of trepidation gone.

 "Breaking last night, a huge story has emerged!" Pearl practically shouted. "The police station was attacked! There are a lot of conflicting responses, but a huge explosion hole in the side of the building seems to be how the assailant entered. None of the police were seriously harmed, but there  _ is _ one missing person."

 Marina smiled. "That's right, the octoling. She was resc- taken last night by an unknown inkling. Testimonies by the engaging officers suggest that the suspect may have been a sanitized individual due to the odd properties of their tentacles."

 "The two evaded police, and nobody knows where they are anymore," Pearl said. "So, best of luck to you, police! Something tells me you're going to need it."

 

* * *

 

 A sense of foreboding lingered over Cuttlefish's shoulders. Of course he was happy about Eight being free, and he was pretty certain about who had caused her freedom. Neither of those factors were really what caused his concern.

 His commanding officer calling him in for an urgent meeting, however, was very worrying.

 Cap'n Cuttlefish reached the bottom of the office building he had been told to go to. The NSS obviously couldn't be run out of a fancy military base if they hoped to keep people in the dark about the continuing conflicts against the octarians, so they had to make do with rented office space. It was cramped sometimes, but the discretion was important.

 Cuttlefish boarded an elevator bound for the eighth floor. Irony, wasn't it? He exited once he reached the floor and made his way to the assigned office. He could see his commanding officer through the glass wall before he even entered. The man was large, intimidatingly so. He sported dark gray tentacles on his head, and he radiated superiority. Cuttlefish had half a mind to turn back now and not face his boss, but he had no choice. He turned the door handle.

 "Captain Cuttlefish," the man in the room said.

 "Major," Cuttlefish said as he bowed his head slightly.

 "Have a seat," the Major said, gesturing to an open chair across from the desk he was sitting at. Cuttlefish sat down and found that the chair had deliberately been set to the lowest setting so that he had to look up to meet the Major's eyes. It was a power move, and those were not uncommon from the inkling sitting across from him.

 "So, what did you need me for?" Cuttlefish said, hoping to get on with the discussion.

 "I'm sure you know what my concern is," the Major said. "It's been all over the news today."

 "Ah. The octoling," Cuttlefish said.

 "Yes, thank you. But my primary concern is what the news didn't say," the Major said. "Some of the claims of the policemen describe an inkling wearing a very familiar-sounding yellow vest and weilding a very familiar-sounding shooter. I want to hear your take on this."

 "To be honest, I don't know what to take from it," Cuttlefish said. He thankfully had quite a poker face.

 "It's highly possible that either your supplies have been raided or an agent has gone rogue, and for all of our sakes I hope it isn't the latter."

 "I suppose it is a possibility, though," Cuttlefish said.

 "Yes. I wanted to ask you: how is Agent Three doing? Because I have my suspicions," the Major said.

 And here it was. Faking half-truths was easy, but trying to make convincing lies was certainly not. He was backed into a corner. "She abruptly quit on me the same day as the attack and managed to get out with all of her equipment. I guess she could be a suspect."

 "That's not a suspect, Captain. That's a Goddamn incrimination," the Major said, banging a hand on the desk. "I want an agent out and looking for her and the octoling ASAP."

 Cuttlefish sighed. He knew that there wasn't a lot he could do about this situation, but damned if he wasn't going to try.

 "That may be more difficult than anticipated," he said. "A lot of the agents have personally bonded with Three. They might be hesitant."

 "No, it sounds like  _ you _ are hesitant," the Major said. "The octoling must be made to face our justice system. That's final."

 Cuttlefish got to his feet. This all was angering him. "Well maybe if she was actually being _put_ _through_ the justice system, this wouldn't be happening. Maybe we would find out that she wasn't actually responsible for the destruction of that part of the city!"

 The Major was out of his seat too. "Watch your tone with me, Captain. I can cut off your entire operation if I choose to. You would be out of work, and so would everyone below you. Think about your granddaughters before you try and question me."

 That was a low blow. Cuttlefish couldn't do that to them. He knew they could sustain themselves just fine with their singing, but the NSS was their passion. And Agent Four… he barely knew her, but she apparently saved Callie from the clutches of those slimy octarians. Er…  _ mostly _ slimy octarians. He couldn't rip her out of agent work like that while she was in her prime.

 Cuttlefish shakily sat back down. Suddenly he felt much older than he had moments ago.

 The Major stayed standing and leaning over his desk, however. "Good. I want an agent on the job, stat. Take those two down by any means necessary. I don't care what condition they are in when they get here. And I want that gear recovered. You are dismissed."

 Cuttlefish stood back up. Normally he would leave with a salute, but he was really not in the mood. He walked to the door.

 "Captain Cuttlefish, are you planning on leaving me so disrespectfully?" the Major asked with sadistic mischief in his voice.

 Cuttlefish turned back to his commanding officer and, very reluctantly, saluted him.

 "That's good," the Major said. "As you will, Captain."

 And Cuttlefish made his exit, an immeasurable amount of frustration following behind him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Does this story count as dystopian? Because if so, then I can add that onto my 'genres that ghastly has written' list!
> 
> Anyways, let's all collectively hate on Major Fuckface! Cuttlefish has a terrible boss!
> 
> But how will he handle this situation he's been put into?


	13. Chapter 13

 Three woke up, and the right side of her face felt warm. It only took one quick look to figure out why.

 The inkling jumped away from the octoling sleeping next to her. Her first instinct was to attack, but she resisted it. It was just Eight. Right.

 Wait, had she just slept with her head in the crook of Eight's neck? All morning? Woah. That's too close. Bad. No. Too close to the attractive octoling. Wait, did her brain just say attractive? Where did that come from? Brain? Answers needed. Hello? No, Three didn't find Eight attractive. Well, sure, she had a good body and seemed really kind and innocent in a cute way and her eyes kind of glowed in the- HER EYES. SHE WAS AWAKE.

 "Eight! I-" and then Three doubled over. "Aggghh!!!"

 "Agent Three, what's wrong?!" Eight asked, panic overriding any amount of grogginess she might have had from having just woken up.

 "Aghh… my bag… pill bottle…" Three managed as she trembled on the ground, clutching her eye.

 "Okay!" Eight said with zero hesitation. She leaped into action, pushing open Three's large duffel and fishing around for the bottle that she asked for. Pills were one thing she was actually familiar with.

 When she found the bottle, she pried open the lid and dumped out about six little white pills before dashing over to the writhing Three.

 "Are these right?" Eight asked.

 Three didn't respond. She just snatched the pills out of Eight's hand and swallowed them dry.

 After a few minutes of Eight sitting attentively next to Three on the dirt, the inkling finally stopped trembling.

 "Are… are you okay?" Eight asked.

 "Ow…" Three said. "Yeah, I think I'm good now. That… yeah, ow."

 "What happened?" Eight asked.

 "Mmm, my eye hurts sometimes now. Not usually like  _ that _ , but yeah," Three said. "Don't worry about it. I'm good now."

 Eight still looked concerned. "Is it from the stuff that got on your eye in-"

 "Yes, now stop talking about it," Three hissed, and immediately regretted it when she saw the guilty expression it brought to Eight's face.

 "I… I'm sorry, I…" Eight trailed off.

 "No, it's fine. Sorry, that was really bitchy of me," Three said. "Hey… thanks for getting me those pills. You really saved me there."

 Eight's mood seemed to take a 180 from this statement. She gave Three a beaming smile, and it was honestly adorable.

 Wait, fuck, no. Unwelcome! These new feelings are unwelcome! Stop!

 Three turned away, flushed. "Anyways, can you grab some food from the bag? I-I'm starving."

 Eight confidently nodded and moved back to the bag. She put the lid back on the pill bottle and dropped it back in the duffel before searching for food.

 "I'm not finding any nutrition blocks in here," Eight said.

 Three quirked an eyebrow. "You do realize that there are other kinds of food that  _ aren't _ nutrition blocks, right?"

 "Hmmm…" Eight pondered. "Oh! At the police station they fed me this weird food that tasted really good!"

 "That's… Eight, that's just normal food," Three said. "When you were with the Octarians, you didn't  _ ever _ have anything but nutrition blocks?"

 "I… don't have a lot of my memories but… no, I don't think so," Eight said.

 "Well your memory must be wrong about that, because I know for a  _ fact _ that octarians have real food sometimes," Three said.

 "I guess…" Eight said.

 Three got to her feet. "Here, let me help you find the edible stuff." She bent down beside Eight at the bag and started digging into the contents. Eight, trying to be helpful, did the same.

 "What about this?" The octoling asked as she reached for a tin. It was the same tin that Three had already been reaching for, and their hands touched in the middle.

 Three jolted back as if was electricity. No no no why was this happening?  _ What _ was happening?

 "Oh, sorry," Eight said.

 "It's fine!" Three responded, her voice cracking a little. "Just… grab it. It's food."

 Eight did as she was told and examined the tin once it was in her hand.

 "I can't read this," Eight said.

 Oh. Of course. Why would Eight have needed to know the Inkling written language? "They're sardines. Give them a shot," Three said.

 Eight flipped the tab open and looked at the little fish inside.

 "They're… kind of cute," Eight said.

 "They're also very salty, just warning you," Three said.

 Eight took a sardine out of the tin and held it between two of her fingers. She seemed hesitant to dig in. But she didn't end up getting the chance.

 A big fish-like creature launched out of the water and bit on the sardine, almost taking Eight's hand in the process. Thankfully she dropped the morsel before she could become part of the meal.

 The octoling stumbled backwards. "What…?"

 "A salmonid!" Three said, immediately going into combat mode. She whipped out her Hero Shot and fired, only taking a couple of shots to splat the foe. "What was it doing so close to Inkopolis?"

 And then another emerged from the sea. And another, and yet another. A full army of salmonids appeared, wielding weapons and frying pans. And they all had their eyes trained on the two cephalopods.

 "Eight, we have to go," Three said.

 "Are we in danger?" Eight asked.

 "Very big danger, yes!" Three shouted, grabbing her bag from the ground. Stuff started falling out of the open top, some items looking particularly important. "Shit!"

 Eight looked like she wanted to bend down and help Three recollect the lost items, but Three didn't even give her time to consider it. The inkling grabbed Eight by the arm and yanked her out of the alcove just before the salmonid crowd could block them in.

 "Well, there goes  _ that _ hiding place," Three mumbled as she and Eight vacated the area.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And there you go! Three starting to act gay, and Salmonids overrunning their hiding place. There's going to be a lot more of Three and Eight's journey coming up in the future, so I hope you'll stick with me to read it!


	14. Chapter 14

 Eight and Three had to take a temporary hiding spot under a grate in the edge of the city until nightfall. Three wanted them to be able to move under the cover of darkness when it came and not have to worry about any observant pedestrians, and Eight had to agree. During the downtime, Three drifted off with her head on Eight's shoulder again. The octoling didn't mind. In fact, it gave her a nice, bubbly feeling. Trust, she supposed? No, that wasn't it. She trusted Craig. And Pearl and Marina. This was… more.

 Whatever it was, it seemed that Three didn't like it. As soon as she woke up, her face flushed completely green and she tried to pretend none of it had happened. Eight supposed she had overstepped her boundaries by being that close to the inkling. She would keep that in mind in the future: Three didn't want to be near her.

 

 Three, what are you doing??? Why are you so obsessed with being near this octoling???

 Three took a deep, calming breath as the two walked in the dark, empty streets. She needed to stop getting flustered.

 But none of this made sense! She shut herself off from emotions like this long ago, even before the NSS. But… something about Eight… her innocence, her deep-seated softness, the spark that was always in her eyes… she was putting cracks in the walls that Three had spent so much time and tears setting up. Three wasn't sure if she liked that. She also wasn't sure if she _didn't_ like that.

 It didn't matter. None of this mattered. She needed to focus.

 "So… what were those 'Salmonids'?" Eight asked.

 Excellent. A distraction. Thanks, Eight.

 … Dammit, now she was thinking about Eight again. Arrgh!

 "Um… they're these really gross… they're nasty," Three said. "I mean, they're the guys that the octarians get their power eggs from. I'm sure you've heard of them at least once."

 Eight shrugged. "I guess that wasn't my division."

 "What _was_ your division? Any memories come back about that?" Three asked.

 Again, Eight shrugged. "I'm sorry. I'm not very helpful."

 

 That wasn't just about her lack of memories. This whole time, Eight had been dragging Three down. Heck, she wouldn't have quit the New Squidbeak Splatoon if it weren't for her rescue mission for Eight. The octoling knew deep in her heart that she deserved every bit of the judgement that inklingkind placed on her. And yet, Three felt differently. Why?

 "Nothing to be sorry about. I'm pretty sure you didn't get amnesia on _purpose_ ," Three said.

 Eight shook herself mentally and focused back in on her companion. Should she even call Three that? She was clearly superior to a low-ranked octoling like her.

 The inkling in question sighed, oblivious to Eight's internal quarrel. "Anyways, I have no idea why those Salmonids were so close to Inkopolis. They usually only show up further out in the ocean. You know, where there would be power eggs. I really don't know why they would go to the shore like that."

 "Do you think it may have been related to the attack on the city?" Eight asked.

 "Maybe. Or maybe it's just another random thing going to shit that we have to add onto the pile," Three said. "Either way, those Salmonids made us drop a lot of our important stuff. I took stock while we were hiding in the grate- we lost most of the food and the medical supplies, and we lost all of the painkillers, which I can't go without. The good news, though, is that I managed to not drop my Hero Shot. Which means I know where we can go for our next hiding place."

 Eight nodded. "I'll go wherever you want me to." Because she trusted Three. Three was strong and smart and really cool and brave… oh, there was that bubbly feeling again!

 Three nodded. "We're going into the goo laser's ground zero. It's the only place where we'll be able to find a lot of abandoned supplies and where the police wouldn't even try looking."

 Eight's heart sank a little. "Is… is it really okay to take the supplies of those people who were so recently….." Eight didn't want to finish her statement.

 Three sighed again. This whole situation seemed to be weighing quite heavily on her. "Honestly, I don't want to think about it. But we've gotta do it if we're going to keep you alive." The two stopped as they reached the barricade separating ground zero from the rest of the city. Three took the Hero Shot out of her bag and prepped it for battle. "I'll stay with you until we can find you a weapon, and then we'll split up and look for more supplies. Sound good?"

 Eight looked down at the ground. She didn't want to be alone again. Not after Kamabo. And she especially didn't want to be apart from Three. Perhaps it was out of line to ask, but… "Do we have to separate?"

 Three gave Eight a slightly pitying look. "Sorry, but it'll double our chances of finding stuff. You'll be okay. And we'll choose a meeting place before we split up."

 Eight hesitantly nodded. "Okay. I think I can handle that."

 

* * *

 

 Equipped with a brand new ink gun that just happened to be in the first place they looked, Eight was now on her own. And… struggling.

 She wished she had learned how to read Inkling at some point. Clearly Marina didn't have that problem, but maybe Pearl helped with that. Or Marina was just better and more qualified than Eight. That was also possible.

 So there Eight was, in what she assumed was a kitchen and completely unsure of what was food and what wasn't. This jar of green freckly things? What about this can? Or this yellow thing near the sink, for that matter? Okay, that last one was a sponge. She knew that much.

 Eight wandered over to another part of the house, hoping she might find some sort of answers. Instead, she managed to find a duffel bag. And so she crammed literally everything that seemed remotely like it might be food into it. She also added in any pill bottles she found, hoping that one of them might be pain medication for Three.

 It boggled Eight's mind that painkillers were so accessible here. Eight, with her flawed memory, could remember only very rarely being given the privilege of pain medication. But that must have just been her place in the world. Pain relief was for important people. People like Three.

 After going through the same process in the kitchens of a few more houses, Eight zipped the duffel up with some difficulty and headed to the meetup point. Along the way she ducked into a corner to avoid a sanitized inkling shambling along the roads. She could have easily taken it out, but… now that she really knew that it had once been a person, had once had goals, a family, a job, a home… she wanted to avoid any combat with them if she could.

 She reached the designated meeting spot- a deactivated and dried-up fountain- and saw Three already waiting. In fact, she looked like she was starting to doze off.

 "Three, I am so so sorry that I took so long," Eight said, quickly shuffling to be in front of the inkling.

 "It's all good," Three said, clearly trying to wake herself up. "I've only been here about five minutes. My stupid body just wants to go back to sleep for no reason."

 "Oh, okay," Eight said.

 "Here, I found some clothes. We both haven't changed in a while, and I'm sure you'd like to get out of that prison getup." Three pulled several clothing options out of her duffel. "I'll sort through that bag you've got while you get changed."

 Eight laid her new shooter on the edge of the fountain, handed Three the duffel, and took the stack of outfits offered to her. What a world this was- she actually got to _choose_ her outfit! She wasted no time stripping out of her old clothes, and then bent down to select some pieces from the stack. She ended up choosing a tight crop top and some shorts. They reminded her a bit of her old uniform.

 She finished donning her new getup and then looked to Three, who seemed to be averting her eyes for some reason.

 "Is everything okay?" Eight asked.

 "Yes!" Three said in a high-pitched voice, her eyes still staring down into Eight's duffel bag. "Yeah, uh, just… yeah. Yes." She cleared her throat. "Anyways," and then Three looked at Eight, now fully dressed, and flushed green once again, "Uh, um…"

 Eight looked down at herself. "Did I make a bad choice? I'm sorry."

 "No, you're fine. It's nothing," Three said.

 

 God dammit, who gave this octoling the right to be _this_ attractive in a crop top? Three was not okay.

 "So," the inkling cleared her throat again, "I probably shouldn't have sent you to look for specific stuff when you can't read any labels, huh?" Three reached her hand into Eight's duffel and dug around a bit. "Well, you managed to get mostly useful stuff anyways. And some painkillers! Good work."

 "It wasn't an issue, really," Eight said. "You saved me. I owe you a lot. This doesn't even begin to repay you."

 Three sighed. "I keep telling you, I did it because I can't stand people who refuse to give a shit about what they do to others. It was the right thing to do. You don't have to owe me anything."

 Eight timidly looked away from the inkling. Three guessed that must have not been what she had been wanting to hear. But what _did_ she want to hear? It didn't make any sense…

 "Well hello there, you two!" A new voice said out of nowhere.

 Eight and Three were on their feet in an instant and aiming their Shooters at the source of the disturbance.

 Above them, standing on the only functioning lamp post and with a Brella drawn, was none other than Agent Four.

 "You ladies are hard people to track down."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ohohoooo boy!
> 
> I would just like to give a genuine thank you to the readers and the commenters for this story. It may not be my most popular one, but it's the one I'm most proud of. And you people keep me posting it! So give yourselves a pat on the back and feel free to comment your thoughts.
> 
> ... I may have written five extra chapters for this while I should have been working on SSM. Whoops!


	15. Chapter 15

 Cuttlefish didn't feel particularly good about sending the new agent after her predecessor (and the even newer agent), but his hands were truly tied. He only hoped that she could do what he asked of her in as painless a way as possible.

 Right now, however, the Captain needed to focus on other things. It was clear that time was beginning to run out for his two prodigies. Even if Agent Four wasn't able to locate them, eventually someone would. True, Inkopolis was a big place, but it was largely isolated. There was nowhere to run away from the city, except maybe Octo Valley. And considering that Three was trying to keep this issue away from the New Squidbeak Splatoon, it was unlikely that she would lead Eight there.

 At some point, someone would find them. So before that time came, someone needed to find evidence to undeniably prove Eight's innocence.

 That person was going to be good ol' Cuttlefish.

 He slowed his speedboat down to a stop at the edge of the metal barge that was actually the hidden entrance to Kamabo, and then tied his boat off on a metal spoke. He mustered up all of his strength to pull himself up a ladder to the top of the ship.

 And a policeman was upon him immediately.

 "Sir, this area is not open to civilians! I need to ask that you please leave," the officer said.

 This policeman seemed easy to spook. Time for Cuttlefish to work his words.

 "Civilian? _Civilian?_ How dare you, sonny!" Cuttlefish said. "I have been an investigator for cases like this for _how_ many years, and you have the audacity to call me a civilian to my face?"

 "I-I'm sorry sir, I just-"

 "Save the jibber-jabber for someone who wants to hear your opinion! I've been sent here specifically to do the job that you lot have completely failed at doing," Cuttlefish barked out.

 "I thought… I thought that the investigations were almost over…?" the policeman meekly said.

 "They'll be _over_ when I'm done with them," Cuttlefish asserted. "Now out of my way or your chief will be hearing about your rude behavior."

 The officer was out of Cuttlefish's path in an instant.

 "Smart boy," Cuttlefish said, hobbling his way towards the center of the ship. He wouldn't be one to condone lying, but he had to admit… it was quite exhilarating.

 He looked down into the daunting hole towards the Deepsea Metro and once again found his nemesis. A ladder. A really big one, in fact. He had enough trouble getting up this monstrosity when he had been escaping Kamabo. He couldn't imagine how those Off the Hook ladies managed to take the unconscious Agents Three and Eight up with them. That was some serious muscle strength. Ah, how Cuttlefish missed being young and strong. This ladder wouldn't be so much of a problem if he was.

 "Um, is everything alright...?" the officer from before asked.

 "Yes yes, go patrol or whatever it is you do. I'll be heading down in a moment," Cuttlefish said, reverting back to his harsher voice. The policeman turned around and started minding his own business again.

 The older inkling resigned himself to his fate, and then started his trek downwards.

 

* * *

 

 He had been in this god forsaken laboratory-metro for a long time. The place had been a prison for him and Agent Three, and more of a torture chamber for Agent Eight. So he had no idea why he didn't remember the place being so cold.

 He slowly made his way down into the depths of the facility, thankful that the numerous traps were all shut off now. Why they were shut off, Cuttlefish didn't quite know. But it sure made his job easier.

 The captain was no fool. He knew how dangerous this investigation could end up being. That was precisely the reason for the ink pistol he had hidden under his shirt. He may have been lacking the dexterity and fierceness of his youth, but he could still shoot. He assumed.

 After a particularly tricky room where he had to find many creative solutions to avoid breaking his knees from a fall, Cuttlefish arrived back at the oh-so-memorable metro station.

 The broken blender was gone now. He doubted that the police cared enough about the investigation to dive this deep into the metro, so it had to have been someone- or something- else.

 Cuttlefish turned his eyes away from the station to the train itself. And… he was off-put immediately. It was silent. Silent, and completely dark. He moved to a door, leaned his cane against the side of the train, and then attempted to pry the doors open with his hands. They moved a little, but he couldn't get them to open all the way, so he picked his cane back up and jammed it into the small opening he had created between the doors. Using the leverage it created, he was able to open them just enough to squeeze his way in.

 The train was completely abandoned. Or empty, rather, because the imagery did not seem to imply that the passengers vacated willingly. That green ooze was all over the place, and there were scratched and scuffed marks everywhere. There was clearly a struggle, and it seemed like the passengers lost that struggle. A grim scene indeed.

 Cuttlefish was about to step back out of the train, but something below one of the seats caught his eye. He bent down (slowly, so as not to injure his fragile knees) and reached for the object. Upon pulling it out, he knew exactly what it was.

 "The conductor's hat?" Cuttlefish mumbled. It was undeniable: this was the hat that C. Q. Cumber fellow was always wearing. But it was crushed and damaged. It couldn't be. That blue cuke had followed every one of the phone's protocols. There was no way that the slimy AI would turn on him… right?

  Cuttlefish jerked backwards as he heard a noise. What? But… no one was here! Cuttlefish looked to the door he had entered from and found it to be closed all of a sudden. No. This couldn't be… but a look out the window showed the truth.

 The train was moving.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A little Cuttlefish chapter for y'all. With a side dish of evil and foreboding! Yay!
> 
> Guys, I have written an unreasonable amount for this story. The upload schedule is going to speed up, at least for a little bit. Hope you enjoy that!


	16. Chapter 16

 Three protectively put her arm in front of Eight and narrowed her eyes up at the newcomer. "Hey Agent Four. Nice to see you again. I'd like to give you the benefit of the doubt, but right now I'm pretty uncertain about why you're here."

 "Woah, woah, chill it," Four said, stowing her Brella and putting her hands up. "I come in peace."

 "I find that… is suspicious the word? Maybe the one I'm looking for is 'bullshit'," Three said, and though Eight's gun wavered, her inkling companion's stayed aimed right at the short-tentacled inkling.

 "No, honest. I'm not here to catch you," Four said, crossing her heart. "Well, maybe I'm supposed to, but I don't plan to. The Captain told me to track you down, but was super unspecific about what I should do after that. And would you look at that! I finished step one!"

 Three kept her eyes narrowed, but lowered her Shooter. "How did you end up finding us?"

 "Oh! Well I was just like, 'Where would a super cool secret agent want to hide?' and so I went here! And I found you. I knew you would go straight to the place where the danger is!"

 "Actually, this was the second place we went," Eight said.

 "Well, I was  _ almost _ completely right!" Four said, sitting down on the elevated street light and swinging her legs. "So hey, you're that octoling that everyone's been talking about. Eight, right?"

 Eight nodded tentatively.

 "Great! Well, if Three's vouching for you, then I'm sure you're cool," Four said.

 "You can't be serious," Three said. "You and I have only met one time before this!"

 "Yeah, and I could tell you were cool back then, too," Four said. "Life's too short to spend it not liking the people around you."

 Three rolled her eyes. "Alright, fine. You  _ do _ seem like that trusting of a person." She removed her arm from in front of Eight. "Hop on down here so we can actually talk, not… stare at each other menacingly through the darkness."

 Four nodded, then took her Brella back out. She shot a patch of ink below her and dove into it in squid form. Then she re-emerged in her normal form.

 "So, how have things been on the run?" Four asked, now standing at their level.

 "Well… pretty bad, to be honest. But we're managing," Three said.

 "Glad to hear it! Marie and Callie would be really sad if you were suffering," Four said. "So what are you doing right now?"

 "Right now? We just finished scavenging for supplies. Eight brought back a bag that's  _ mostly _ filled with food," Three said, pulling a cheese grater out of the bag and tossing it aside.

 Four nodded. "Good thing to have."

 "We're probably going to look for a shelter next. If you want, you can-" and then Three stopped and brought her Shooter back up. "Footsteps."

 Four looked around. "From where?" And then a glob of corrupted green ink struck her hand.

 A sanitized inkling pounced from the shadows at the group, but Eight and Three gunned it down on the spot. It splatted into a combination of green and red ink.

 "You okay, Four?" Three asked.

 "Ghah!" Four winced out, clutching at the hand that had been shot. She started frantically trying to shake the ink off of it, and then rubbed it in the dirt. Once the ink had fully cleared from the hand, Four relaxed. "What the heck, that hurt so much! That stuff burns!"

 "It does," Eight plainly confirmed with a small nod.

 Three gave Eight a concerned glance, then turned back to Four. "But are you okay now?"

 "Yeah, I'm good. Jeeze, this place is dangerous," Four said. "Anyways, you were saying something about finding a shelter?"

 "Yeah. It'd be nice to avoid  _ those _ kinds of encounters as much as we can," Three said, gesturing to the ink splash from their sudden opponent. Then she stretched out her arms a bit. "Wanna join us?"

 Four smiled her bubbly smile. "I'd love to. Lead the way!"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this was a bit of a short chapter, and there's a reason for that: this used to be part of another chapter that turned out to be way too big, so I split it up. I'll try to post the rest soon!
> 
> Please feel free to comment and talk about how Eight and Four are both precious cinnamon buns and we love them both!
> 
> (Even if Eight's cinnamon bun is a little scarred)


	17. Chapter 17

 The two inklings and octoling made their way through the abandoned gray streets, with Three leading the pack and Four taking up the rear. And for a while the latter was strangely quiet. Then she spoke up out of nowhere.

 "Hey, I thought Three only stabbed you in the front, Eight," she said.

 Three froze in place. "What."

 "She has a bandage over her back, too," Four said.

 Three turned to the octoling, berating herself for never having noticed this before. Upon the former agent looking at her, Eight instinctively started covering the bandaged section with her arm.

 "Eight, let me see it," Three said.

 "... Please, don't worry about it," Eight said

 "Eight. Turn around. Now," Three said forcefully.

 The octoling flinched and then complied immediately, which didn't exactly make Three feel good about the tone she used. But now that Eight had stopped hiding it… yeah, there was a massive amount of bandaging on the octoling's back. With the crop top Eight was wearing it was a lot easier to see than it was with the full prison top she had been in before.

 "What's this from?" Three asked, more softly this time.

 "I'm fine, I promise," Eight said.

 "I'm not so sure about that. Please answer the question," Three said.

 Eight stared at the ground. "Th-that's… um… whenever I failed a test, there was an ink bomb… and it, uh…"

 Three sighed. "That's where it blew you up. And this infected ink burns, so it really hurt you. Am I getting this right?"

 "... Yes," Eight said.

 "Eight… has it been hurting this whole time?" Three asked.

 "Uh, n-no! Not much!" Eight said.

 Three knew a lie when she heard one. "And your stab wound too… here, take two of these." The former agent dug around in a duffel for the bottle of painkillers and pried it open with her teeth. She held it out to the octoling.

 Eight pushed it back towards Three. "No, those are for you. You need them more than me."

 "I'm not the one one with the stab wound, and apparently acid burns," Three said, once again gesturing the pill bottle to Eight.

 "It's fine, really! I've had way worse before," Eight said.

 "Umm… that's kind of concerning that you've been worse off than a knife wound in the gut," Four jumped in to say.

 "Eight, I'm not going to move until you take some of these," Three said.

 Eight finally conceded and took a few painkillers, just as she was asked.

 "Thank you," Three said. "Hopefully that'll help you feel better."

 "Hey, can we talk about the fact that you've apparently been hurt worse than this?" Four said. "Like, how is that?"

 "I…" Eight racked her brain, but couldn't come up with anything. "Sorry, I don't remember."

 "You don't… remember?" Four raised an eyebrow.

 "I don't remember a lot of things," Eight said.

 "When she was brought into the Deepsea Metro, the  _ thing _ that did this gooey stuff to the city messed with her brain somehow and erased all of her memories. Or at least blocked them or something," Three said.

 Eight nodded. "Sometimes I will remember things by accident, though. Whenever a conversation or something else makes me think about my past, sometimes something will come up."

 "Then that's all we have to do! Jog your memory!" Four said.

 "Hm?" Eight questioned.

 "That's… not a bad idea. Maybe we could help you remember some things," Three said. "Personally I'm very curious about your past and the multiple…" she searched for the right word, " _ questionable  _ things you've brought up about it. Let's sit here and try to work this out."

 The three took a seat at a bench that was luckily unscathed from any sanitized ink or goo. Or rather Three and Eight sat on the bench and Four sat on the ground, facing them.

 "So, what do you think will help, Eight?" The younger inkling asked.

 "Um, well… if you wouldn't mind… maybe telling me about your past will help me remember mine?"

 "Sounds like a plan," Four said. "Three, do you want to start with your thrilling origins?"

 "Not thrilling. Pretty boring, actually," Three said. "My parents were abusive pieces of shit so I ran away when I was five. I looked them up a year or two ago, and it turns out they're dead now. So yeah, that's that."

 "Okay, did 'boring' change definitions recently and I missed it?" Four asked. "Dude, that had to have been hard. I'm sorry."

 "Meh, I'm over it. Yeah, there were times when I struggled, but it was way better than being anywhere near my asshole parents. Plus I ended up in foster care eventually, which helped out," Three said, before rubbing her eye a bit and taking another painkiller.

 "I don't think I ever really knew my parents. I don't know where they went or what happened to them, but I think I remember not having them around," Eight said.

 "That sounds… uncommon, but possible for octolings," Three said. "It never quite seemed like they are as tied to family bonds as inklings usually are, from what I've seen."

 "I guess it's my turn then!" Four said, leaning backwards on her hands. "I was born right in the center of Inkopolis and had a pretty happy life. My parents were pretty wealthy and they took good care of me. My mom… uh, my mom…" her mood visibly sunk. "She passed away when I was twelve. I miss her… a lot." Four made a little sigh. "But my dad is still here, and I love him very much." The inkling smiled again. "So, that one do anything for ya'?"

 "... No, I don't think so. I'm sorry," Eight said. "Your dad does sound like a lovely person, though." She gave such a sincere, heartfelt smile that Three had to look away to keep her composure.

 "Okay, so..." Three cleared her throat. "What do you think would help now?"

 "I don't really know," Eight said. "I think most of my life might have been spent serving the military."

 "Then we could tell you about how we became agents!" Four said. "Can I go first?"

 "Sure. I'd actually really like to hear this one," Three said.

 "I would as well," Eight said.

 "Cool!" Four said. "So there I was, looking around Inkopolis Square, when I see a mysterious woman dive into a grate. Now, given that I have a policy of not allowing mysteries to go unsolved, I chased after her. And she turned out to be… Marie! Of the Squid Sisters!" Four emphasized this by throwing her arms up in the air. "... Who I had never heard of at the time."

 "Really? You'd never heard of them?" Three asked. "They're pretty famous, and also sort of pricks."

 "Nah, they're really cool! Marie especially!" Four said.

 "Yeah, try working with them for two years," Three mumbled.

 "I would love to give them a proper thank you someday," Eight said. "They broke me from DJ… uh, DJ…"

 "Octavio," Three helped.

 "Yes! Their song broke me from his control. I am so grateful," Eight said.

 "Hopefully you'll get that chance!" Four said. "Anyways, to summarize, DJ Octavio kidnapped Callie and the Great Zapfish and was keeping Callie brainwashed with some sunglasses and I had to fight them both and then Marie shot off the brainwash-y glasses and they sang Calamari Inkantation together and I defeated Octavio, the end."

 Three looked like she had whiplash from that explanation. "I'm sorry, what?! Octavio got out?! Callie was  _ kidnapped _ ?!?!"

 "Uh, yeah. And brainwashed, and all that other stuff I said," Four said.

 Three rubbed her temples. "That's a lot to take in." She then looked at Eight. "You get anything?"

 "I kind of remember hearing Calamari Inkantation on that day again, but not much more than that," Eight said.

 "Darn," Four said.

 "Okay, guess it's my turn," Three said. "Well, my mission involved the Great Zapfish, too. I met Cap'n Cuttlefish, and at first I thought he was just some old kook. But… he's actually way smarter than he lets on. And yet he still manages to be a big kook anyways." She let out just a little smile. "Anyways, I wasn't that good at… well, anything back then. I failed a lot. And I probably complained a lot."

 Eight looked at Three with a concerned look while leaning forward. "What did the captain do when you complained?"

 "Mm, usually rolled his eyes," Three said, and then she started sending Eight a similarly concerned look. "What happened when you complained in the octarian army?"

 "Various things," Eight said, clearly recalling memories. Both inklings made a conscious choice to stay as silent as possible to prevent from distracting the octoling. "Sometimes if someone in my platoon complained we would all go without food for the rest of the day. Other times we would be whipped or beaten until we begged for forgiveness. A few times our sergeant even made us all take our clothes off and run laps completely naked while another platoon shot us with ink so that we were constantly on the verge of splatting." Eight smiled as if this was a funny anecdote, but the expression faded when she saw the looks that the two inklings were giving her. "What? Is that not normal?"

 "No. Not normal at all," Three said, concern overtaking her entire expression. "Eight… that's not even a thing that's normal for Octarians."

 "Dude, what the heck was up with your platoon?" Four asked.

 "I-I don't know… I thought that all of the low-ranking Octolings were treated like that…" Eight said.

 The octoling looked like she was about to have an existential crisis, so Three sighed and spoke up. "I think that's enough memory searching for today. If I ever find your sergeant I'm going to punch him really hard in the face."

 "Hey," Four said, looking off into the distance. Three and Eight followed her gaze. "Helicopters. I think it's the police."

 She was right. Several helicopters were flying over the abandoned section of the city, searchlights blaring on the ground. And they were headed in their direction.

 "Shit," Three said, standing up from the bench. "I didn't think they'd have the balls to search here. We need to find some decent cover."

 But then the sound of footsteps started emerging. Lots of footsteps.

 Four furrowed her eyebrows. "What the-"

 And then a few sanitized inklings made themselves visible in the distance. And then more. And more.

 It was a stampede.

 "Oh no, the helicopters are driving the zombie inklings this way!" Four said.

 "I'll take care of them," Three said, clutching her Hero Shot.

 "No, I will," Four said as she drew her Brella.

 "Hey, no offense but I've been at this job for longer than you have," Three said. "Take Eight and go find somewhere safe."

 "No,  _ you  _ take Eight. I've got this handled," Four said, aiming her gun.

 "Are you listening to me? I said I'm more capable of dealing with this," Three said.

 "Stop making this into a competition! If you stay here, the police will catch you and you'll be thrown in jail where Eight just was," Four said. "Jeeze, I'm not that smart, but  _ you _ need to think with your head!"

 Three was about to counter, but the logic behind the argument gave her pause.

 "Go. Find somewhere to get out of the way of searchlights and keep Eight safe from the police." Four smiled, and then winked. "Don't worry about me, I'm a natural at this."

 Three hesitated, then grabbed Eight's arm and the two ran without another word.

 Four watched them go, then looked at the fast-approaching enemies.

 "Alrighty then," she said. "Who am I splatting first?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was a really long chapter, and it used to be even longer!
> 
> In summary, Eight has a... complicated past that we will be learning more about in the future and Three is constantly concerned about her.
> 
> Anyways, have a nice day!
> 
> (Four's gonna die.)


	18. Chapter 18

Jerry the Roller @jerryroller  
Okay, at this point it's pretty much official, right? We've all been seeing @lowefforttagging 's posts about Marina being an octoling. Why is she still allowed to be on the news?  
236 retweets | 201 favorites  
11:20 PM  
  
Nessie Gerome ✓ @Nessiematch  
Im sorry, are you telling me that Octoling liar Marina is still not behind bars? Wtf, police! Get on that shit  
5345 retweets | 2819 favorites  
11:23 PM 

AAAAAAAAAA @lowefforttagging  
@jerryroller glad people are finally seeing reason about marina. put her in jail!  
4703 retweet | 2007 favorites  
11:31 PM

Squidlock Official ✓ @SquidlockYT  
Next video coming up soon! This one's about one thing and one thing only: are octolings trying to subjugate us and make us their slaves? It will also talk about a person who has become a very questionable figure recently. Bet you can't guess who!  
731 retweets | 520 favorites  
11:33 PM

Shara Loves You @shareashara  
Marina, please. I don't want to believe it. Please just say something, anything about this to ease our minds. I don't care what race you are, but everyone's calling you some sort of criminal! What is going on???  
5 retweets | 2 favorites  
11:45 PM

Glockglock Kenny @KennyB  
People keep talking about locking Marina up, but if that octoling b*tch were to suddenly 'disappear', I wouldn't blame whoever's responsible. In fact, I'd thank them.  
840 retweets | 314 favorites  
12:02 PM

 

* * *

 

Inkopolis Police Department @IPDofficial  
We have heard your concerns, and they are highly justified. There's no need to be afraid, though. We're going to be taking Marina in. We anticipate for her to be in custody by the end of the day.  
6034 retweets | 4999 favorites  
4:00 PM

 

* * *

 

 "This is really, really bad," Marie said, pacing in the Squid Sisters' cabin. "Oh, this is so bad."

 "If Marina ends up in the grubby hands of the police, there's no way she's getting back out again. Not after Eight escaped," Callie said. "So yeah, you're right. This is fucked!"

 "We can't let this happen," Marie said. "I can't stand seeing people turning on someone they used to love like this…"

 "It sucks so much. They're hating on her for _existing_. That's so not cool," Callie said.

 "Callie, we need to stop the police," Marie said. "I know that it would be breaking the law a billion times over, but this isn't right."

 "We don't  know where they're going, though!" Callie said. "Pearl and Marina live in some mansion somewhere and have never said where publicly. Understandably, because you don't want crazy fans at your doorstep."

 "Actually, I know where their house is," Marie said. "Back when we were trying to find a way to get Eight out of jail, I figured out their address and sent them a letter to say that we were trying to help. Just thought they should know, y'know?"

 "Yeah," Callie said. "So, we should head over there and help them!"

 Marie picked up her Charger. "Way ahead of you."

 "Go ahead. I'll be right behind you," Callie said, heading to her room to grab her Roller.

 Marie nodded, and headed out of the door. Callie, now armed, returned to the main room. She was about to follow after her cousin, but she stopped.

 She stopped and looked at the safe in the corner of the room.

 

* * *

 

 All of the negativity online had really been getting to Marina, so Pearl stepped in. They both turned their phones off and cuddled on the couch all day. After Marina had calmed down a bit, it was perfect.

 Then some asshole started banging on the door.

 Pearl got off of her girlfriend and grumbled, "You've gotta be kidding me…."

 Then a voice came shouting through the door.

 "This is the Inkopolis Police. We're here to take you in, Marina. Don't try to resist."

 Pearl and Marina both froze in place. Pearl was the first to move, kicking over a table and pushing it in front of the doors.

 "What are you doing?" Marina asked. "We can't just _resist_ the police!"

 "The fuck we can't! I'm _not_ giving you to them!" Pearl shouted, grabbing her Dualies. "I told you that I wouldn't let anyone get to you. I'm not givin' up on you!"

 "Pearlie…" Marina put a hand over one of her hearts.

 "Go. Get out of sight so they won't be able to find you if they get past me," Pearl said, her tone dead serious.

 "Pearl, I'm not going to leave you to fight them alone!" Marina objected.

 "Alright, then go get a Brella and come help me. As long as you end up safe, I'd be happy to have your help."

 Marina nodded before rushing up the Grand staircase as fast as she could. Pearl turned back to the door.

 "You're not getting her, you racist pieces of shit!" Pearl shouted.

 "Pearl, this doesn't concern you," the policeman who had spoken before said. "Just let us in and-"

 "It sure as _fuck_ concerns me! It concerns me a lot, in fact! Get the fuck away from my house!"

 "If you do not open the door, we _will_ break it down," the policeman threatened.

 "Go for it, you pigs!" Pearl exclaimed, leveling her Dualies at the closed door.

 There was a bang. Then another. Fuck, did the police have a battering ram? They came prepared.

 Bang.

 Bang.

 Crack! A hole was punctured in the door. A face peered in through the breach, and Pearl immediately shot it. The sound of someone splatting came from the other side.

 "Stop resisting!" a policewoman shouted.

 "How about no?!" Pearl shouted back.

 Bang. They started working at breaking down the door again. Pearl was sweating now. She might have bit off more than she could chew.

 The whole top of the door panel snapped off, and the fight really began. Police started shooting through the opening, and Pearl dodge-rolled the attacks before sending her own. The police may have had more people, but Pearl ran Splatfests. She was one of the icons of turf wars. She knew what she was doing.

 But damned if there weren't a _lot_ of police.

 The rest of the door came crashing open, shoving the overturned table out of the way and allowing the police to start pushing into the foyer. Well, not if Pearl had anything to say about it. She dashed left and right, splatting officers on sight. She was a destructive force. She was danger incarnate.

 … She was losing ground. The police kept pushing and pushing, and she started to get hit from all angles by various colors of ink. She couldn't handle this. She couldn't last much longer. She was only one inkling.

 A splotch of green ink came from above, splatting two police officers and giving Pearl a bit of room to maneuver.

 She was one inkling. But she also had an amazing, wonderful octoling girlfriend.

 "Sorry I took so long, Pearlie!" Marina shouted, sliding down the railing of the grand staircase to stand at her girlfriend's side and protect her with the shield of her Brella.

 Pearl grinned. The house was a wreck, they were outnumbered, and even more police were funneling in from the doorway. But with Marina at her side, she could pull off anything.

 

 Marie arrived to see a mob of police squeezing through the doorway to the mansion. Not good. She needed to do something fast.

 She shot a line of ink near the officers and swam closer. Then she stowed the charger and put her hands up.

 "Everybody stop!" she shouted.

 "… Woah, it's Marie from the Squid Sisters," one of the officers said, and it drove a great number of them to stop and pay attention to the idol.

 "What you're doing isn't right!" Marie said. "Seriously, what crime did Marina commit? Why are you so bent on capturing her if the only thing that she's done is sing for you, get the news to you, organize Splatfests for you… why all of this hatred?"

 "Well… she's an octoling," one officer said.

 "And what does that matter?" Marie asked. "Seriously, what does her being an octoling change? And don't give me the crap that octolings are schemers and killers. She's still Marina. In one Splatfest she represented the side of love. Remember that?"

 The cops were silent, and seemed to be pondering.

 "You can't just say that she's evil because of what she is. It's her actions that should matter, don't you think?" Marie smiled calmly. "You can stop this, you know. You can stop an innocent person from spending life in jail. You just have to step away."

 This time the silence was heavy and pensive. Slowly, some of the officers started to lower their guns.

 "That's good. Come on, we can still fix this," Marie said.

 Then pink ink started raining from the skies.

 "What the-" an officer said before exploding into ink.

 "It was a trap!" another cried out before the same happened to him.

 "No! It wasn't!" Marie pleaded, but the officers had already been splatted. She turned and found herself staring at a massive Splatling. A Splatling held by Callie.

 "Callie, why-" and then Marie noticed a very crucial detail: Callie was wearing shades. Shades with pink lights on the lenses. _The_ shades. "... No!"

 Callie grinned evilly. "Hey cuz. How are things?"

 "Wh-where did you find those?! I thought we moved them when gramps got here?!" Marie asked.

 "That big old safe, where else?" Callie said, rubbing a finger along the top of her Splatling. "The old man tried to keep it from getting opened, but he didn't expect someone to try every combination sequentially until they found the right one. I've spent… a _lot_ of time at that locker." She leaned backwards a little into a power pose. "Anyways, I'm gonna kill you now."

 She started firing at her fellow Squid Sister. Marie tried to get a good shot on the brainwashing sunglasses, but was knocked back by Callie's ink. She managed to toss a burst bomb at the ground and dive in and out of its ink splat to avoid getting completely splatted, and she managed to get some cover to take off the pressure. She ducked back out and aimed right at Callie's eyes, except Callie wasn't there anymore. At all.

 "See ya', loser!" she heard Callie's voice say, and then she heard the sound of a super jump. Marie dashed out to see, but was only able to pick up a pink trail high up in the sky. Maybe if she kept an eye on it and followed it with her own super jump, she could track Callie and bring her back…

 "Are you okay, Pearlie?"

 "Yeah, I'm fine babe. Just a little shot-up."

 Marie sighed. One thing at a time.

 She walked towards the mansion. All of the police were gone now, which made it easy to see that the front room was absolutely trashed. Ink everywhere, shattered pottery and statues and bookshelves, and two cephalopods breathing heavily in the center of it all. Marie stepped through where the doorway used to be and knocked on the door frame, just to be polite.

 Pearl and Marina both snapped their weapons up at her, looking exhausted and startled.

 "Hey, it's okay. I'm not here to fight you. I'm here to help," Marie said.

 At the same time, Pearl and Marina's jaws practically dropped to the floor. Marina actually lost her grip on her Brella and it clattered to the ground.

 "Oh my god, you're Marie! Marie from the Squid Sisters! Oh my god!" Pearl said.

 Marina looked like she was completely stunned into silence.

 Pearl tugged on Marina's arm. "Marina, oh my god, it's Marie! I mean I know we've met before but like… WOW!!!"

 "Uh-huh," Marina said dumbly.

 "Please, we can do this later, but not now," Marie said, and the two members of Off the Hook seemed to calm down a bit. "Those police are going to respawn and come right back here. They're probably gathering up to super jump this minute. I need to get you two out of here."

 "Let 'em come. We'll just smash 'em again!" Pearl said, clapping a hand over her fist.

 "If you want to keep splatting them until the end of time, be my guest. Just never take time to sleep. Or eat. Or rest in any capacity," Marie said.

 "Yeah, I get it…" Pearl said deflatedly.

 "I can get you two somewhere safe, but you need to trust me," Marie said.

 Marina nodded. "I trust you."

 "I do too," Pearl said.

 "Great," Marie said. "Go pick up anything that you can't live without, but keep it light. We have to super jump to where we're going."

 After the two collected their things (and Marie convinced Pearl to significantly downsize her armful of sentimental items), the three pop stars super jumped to the square and dove down the grate that Marie had used many times. She emerged gracefully, and the other two…

 "I… might… throw up…" Pearl said, laying spread-eagle on the dirt while surrounded by her personal possessions.

 "Please… give us a second…" Marina requested.

 "Sorry, I forget that people aren't already used to the speedy transit to Octo Canyon," Marie said.

 "You don't say," Pearl heaved out.

 Marina looked up from the ground. "Where are we, exactly? I know it's Octo Canyon, but I don't think I've ever seen this part of it."

 "It's on the edge. Thankfully, most of inklingkind doesn't know that any of this place exists. You two should be safe here," Marie said, helping pull Pearl to her feet. "That is, if you're okay staying here."

 Marina sighed. "I don't think we have much of a choice... as long as I'm around, I think people are going to be out for us now…" She put her palms up to her head. "... How did things get so messed up?"

 Pearl pulled her into a hug. "It's all going to be okay. So many people love you, Marina. They're just… they just… I don't know. But everything's gonna be alright in the end."

 Marie looked at the two sadly. Poor girls, their lives were just ripped out from under them.

 "We'll accommodate you here as best we can," Marie said, then flinched. " _I'll_ accommodate you as best I can. I'm sorry that all of this is happening. It's not fair to either of you."

 Marina turned to the Squid Sister and bowed her head. "Thank you. For coming to help us and for your hospitality. We would be doomed without your help, and we are so grateful."

 Pearl nodded respectfully. "You're really saving us here. You're saving _her_ , and for that I'd give you anything in the world."

 Marie smiled. "Glad I'm appreciated."

 The Squid Sister looked out into the distance. She had managed to save these two, but at what cost? Callie... where are you? Marie sighed and shook her head. Right now she had people to help. She could start looking for Callie later.

 Marie turned back to the two other cephalopods. "Well then, now that you're going to be staying here I can give you a proper welcome." She straightened her posture and smiled again. "It is my pleasure to pronounce you as Agents Five and Six. Welcome to the New Squidbeak Splatoon."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, a lot happened this chapter. Pearl and Marina were ousted by inkling society, Marie came to help, and Callie was compelled to put the shades back on. Rogue squid! ... except not in a good way this time.
> 
> Come back soon to read the next chapter, and have a better day than any of these characters are having!


	19. Chapter 19

 "I think the helicopters are gone," Three said, peeking out of the little shed they had ducked into.

 Eight sighed in relief. This week had all been too much. Had it been a week? Had it been more? After going straight from Kamabo to a jail cell, she was completely unaware of how long she had been trapped, contained, or tested on. She didn't even really understand the sun's cycles yet. But regardless, Eight was just about at her limit. Not that she would say so to Three. Three shouldn't have to worry about her.

 Oh. Three's eyes were drooping. She looked so tired.

 "Do you want to rest? I could keep watch if you want," Eight said.

 "N-no, sorry. I'm fine," Three said.

 Eight hesitated. It was definitely overstepping to ask, but… "Are you sure? You've done so much for me, and you look really sleepy."

 Three's eyebrows furrowed in frustration for a moment. Then they quickly softened, and Three took a deep breath. "I appreciate your concern. I really do. But my job is to protect you, and I'm not going to rest until that's done."

 Eight felt that bubbly feeling again along with her heart rate going up, which couldn't have been healthy. She decided to stop speaking to see if that would fix the problem. After a few moments her pulse went back to normal, so it must have worked.

 "Ow," Three said, clutching her eye. She grabbed the painkiller bottle and swallowed a few pills. She had had a lot of those…

 "I hope Four is okay," Three said once her mouth was clear. "I didn't wanna leave her back there to deal with that all by herself, but… she was right. We weren't going to make it out of there in anything but cuffs or a body bag if we had stayed."

 "I think she'll be okay. She seemed strong," Eight said.

 "You're right. Having fought her, I can confirm that," Three said. Then she looked at the floor. "Eight, I gotta be honest with you… I don't think this is going to end."

 "What do you mean?" Eight asked, crawling closer to the inkling.

 " _ This _ . The police chasing us. The people senselessly hating you… if something big doesn't happen, nothing's going to change. We'll be running forever."

 Three looked distressed, and before she even realized she was doing it Eight was stroking a hand up and down the former agent's arm. Three froze at the contact, which made Eight rapidly remove her hand.

 "S-sorry…" Eight said.

 "No, it was… it was nice," Three said, her face blushing just a little bit. Whatever that meant, Eight didn't know.

 Three got up to her feet. "No. I shouldn't just get depressed about this. That's basically like giving up on you, and there's no way in hell that I'm doing that."

 Eight looked up at the inkling from the ground. The sun rising behind her left a striking silhouette worthy of Three. Worthy of the person who acted for Eight when no one else could. Worthy of the strongest, bravest cephalopod Eight had ever met.

 "I have an idea, and I guarantee that you are going to hate it," Three said, staring at the sky briefly before giving direct eye-contact to Eight. "They are going to hunt you until the day you die as long as they think you're responsible for this." She gestured broadly to the apocalyptic cityscape around them. "So… what if we got them some evidence that they couldn't possibly ignore? Something so conclusive that they  _ have  _ to pardon you?"

 Eight tilted her head. "Where would we find evidence like that?"

 Three paused. "That's the part you're not going to like."

 Eight's hearts sank. She knew exactly what Three was talking about.

 "... Kamabo…" the octoling quietly mumbled.

 Three nodded. "Before, I could never have gotten away with sneaking in there with all the police swarming the place. But now I'm an outlaw with you. Might as well break some more rules. What are they gonna do, arrest us harder?"

 "I… I don't think I can go back there… to that place..." Eight said in a small, small voice.

 "Eight, I refuse to let anything hurt you,  _ especially _ in that place," Three said, and then reached out a hand. "Do you trust me, Eight?"

 Eight really, really didn't want to go back to that place.

_  You touched enemy ink, test failed. _

 Every memory was unpleasant, if not downright nightmarish.

_  You lost the eight ball, test failed. _

 She had suffered so much to get out of there… and now they were going back in?

_ You ran out of lives, test failed. _

 Please… no… she couldn't do this…

_ You weren't good enough. Test failed. _

_  You are nothing. Test failed. _

_ You are too weak. Test failed. _

_  You let Inkopolis die. Test failed. _

_  Test failed. Test failed. Test failed Test failed Test failedTestfailedTestfailedTest _

_  You failed everyone. You failed. _

__ "Eight! Eight! Calm down, take deep breaths!"

 It was then that Eight realized that her vision was going black. She couldn't breathe, she could barely register what was going on.

 "Eight, breathe with me. In… and out. In… and out."

 The voice was the only thing Eight had left at this point, so she followed its orders religiously. In… and out. In… and out.

 And then her vision slowly returned, and Three was directly in front of her and firmly holding her shoulders. Right now the inkling felt like an anchor, and it was saving her.

 Once her breathing was close to normal and the black specks in her vision had almost cleared, Eight spoke.

 "... Three...?"

 The former agent breathed a sigh of relief. She had looked a little scared herself. "Okay, fuck that plan. We'll figure out something else."

 "I-I'm sorry…" Eight said.

 "You have nothing to be sorry about. I'm the one who suggested it in the first place, like a fucking moron."

 As Three got up from her knees, started pacing, and continued mumbling admonishments at herself, Eight closed her eyes and pondered. She focused on breathing normally, and she did some  _ hard _ thinking.

 "Three," she finally said.

 "Yeah?" The inkling thankfully stopped pacing.

 "Let's do it," Eight said.

 "What?! Dude, just  _ thinking _ about the place gave you a panic attack. I'm not going to make you go through that," Three said.

 "I think…" Eight swallowed down about ten layers of emotions. "... I think if you're there with me, I'll be okay."

 "Really? Me? The girl who tried to kill you twice and almost succeeded?" Three shook her head. "Are… are you sure?"

 "Three, you are the one who has stuck with me through all of this… torment and hatred. I don't think there is anyone in the world that I trust more. I know I can put my faith in you to make the right decisions," Eight said. "This nightmare affects you, too. If you say there's a way to end all of this, and that it will let you have your normal life back, then I will follow you anywhere."

 It was the most heartfelt and  _ real _ thing that Eight had possibly ever said. She meant it. She had met many great people in the past several days, and all of their help and support meant so much to her. But Three… she was so much more. She was so powerful and impressive and important… and yet she took pity on a weak, unimportant octoling like Eight. No, not pity. Something bigger, closer than that, something that Eight didn't know the word for. It made her feel… wanted, and special. Even though she knew she wasn't, Three made her feel important.

 And if Three was by her side, Eight knew that she had nothing at all to fear.

 Three was speechless for a bit. It made sense that she would be. Eight just unloaded a lot onto her. The inkling turned away for a second and let out a held breath. Then she turned back and held her hand out to Eight again.

 "Alright then. I'll do my best to earn that trust."

 Eight smiled brightly, and then took the inkling's hand.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know I've probably said it before, but I'm really proud of this story. It's going places, and I've worked really hard on it. All of Splatoon's characters are perfect conduits for creativity, and I think it has led to something really good. And all of your wonderful comments have made it all the better! Thank you!
> 
> All of that self-congratulatory bullshit aside though, Eight and Three now have a mission. A mission that could get them out of this situation... and a mission that gave Eight a panic attack. Come back next *insert period of time* for the thrilling continuation!


	20. Chapter 20

 Four stumbled through the streets of Inkopolis. Everything was a blur. It hurt to walk, to move, to think. People were trying to talk to her, but she couldn't hear them. They were too muffled. She just kept walking. Walking and walking. It was all muscle memory. She willed herself to keep moving, and then, finally, dropped down the gutter.

 

* * *

 

 "Woah, really? That happened to Callie?" Pearl exclaimed. "That sucks!"

 "Yeah, it did… but Agent Four got her back. It took a lot of work, but we saved her," Marie said. "Or… at least I thought we did…"

 "I'm sorry to hear what happened with her," Marina said. "You can get her back though, right? We just have to find her."

 Marie looked out into the distance of Octo Canyon. "I…"

 And then she saw an inkling struggling towards them.

 "Oh my god, Four?!" Marie called out. She looked _bad_.

 Four limped a bit closer, then stopped in her tracks. Marie watched her, and knew instantly that she was about to topple. The Squid Sister leaped to her feet and dove forward to catch the agent before she could hit the ground. Four went unconscious in her arms..

 "Four?! Four, please tell me you're okay!" Marie shook the inkling to no avail. Upon further examination, Marie found a lot of icky green ink all over Four's body. She tried to brush some of it off, and it burned her hand. "Gah!"

 "Marie? You okay?" Pearl asked as both members of Off the Hook rushed up to assist.

 The Squid Sister shook the stinging out of her hand. "Yeah, I'm fine. That ink hurts, though. We need to get it off of her."

 "I'll fill up a bucket of clean ink," Marina said, running inside.

 "I'll get a sponge or something!" Pearl said, following close behind.

 Left alone with Four's unconscious body, Marie leaned a little closer to it.

 "Please be okay…" she whispered.

 

* * *

 

 Four was cleaned off and changed, and the true extent of the injuries became clear. Besides the ink that had been burning her skin, she had a huge bruise and cut on her head and the rest of her was pretty battered, too.

 Marie had the agent's head on her lap as she tended to the wounds and Pearl… watched.

 "Jeeze… never knew that place was still so dangerous," the short inkling said.

 "I didn't either," Marie said. "If I had known, I probably would have asked her not to go."

 "Didn't your gramps send her, though?" Pearl asked.

 "Yeah, but… just between you and me? I'm more Four's boss than Gramps is," Marie said.

 "Ooo, disrupting the hierarchy. I like it!" Pearl said.

 Then Four stirred in Marie's lap, and the conversation came to an abrupt stop. The agent's eyes opened, seeming glazed-over and unfocused.

 "... Four? Are you okay?" Marie asked.

 "... Marie…" Four mumbled, dazed.

 "Yes, it's me." Marie smiled a bit.

 "... Can I… kiss you…?"

 Marie's face lit up green and her heart rate skyrocketed. "U-um… u-uh-"

 And then Four fell back asleep, completely unaware of the havok she had wreaked on the Squid Sister.

 Pearl snorted, then burst out laughing.

 Marie glared at her. "What's so funny?"

 "Oh man, you've got it bad," Pearl said, wiping a tear out of her eye.

 "I don't know what you mean by that," Marie said, defiantly crossing her arms and looking to the side. The weight of Four's head on her lap was about twice as noticeable now.

 "Look, if you're not going to admit that you have a big ol' crush, then I can do it for you," Pearl said, grinning evilly. " _Blackbelly Skatepark, Ancho-V Games, Marie wants to get herself a dame!_ "

 "Alright, shut up already," Marie said. "Jeeze, we barely know each other and you're already throwing childish nursery rhymes at me."

 "Mmhmm!" Pearl hummed proudly.

 Marie sighed. "Yes. I like Four. And she doesn't know that, so we will _not_ discuss it when she's awake, alright?"

 "Aww, that's sooo cute!" Pearl exclaimed. "You two would make a poppin' couple. I can already tell."

 "... I'll take that as a compliment, I guess," Marie said.

 "So why aren't you two together yet?" Pearl asked, swinging her legs under her chair. "I mean, she _did_ just tell you to kiss her."

 "Because that was just her concussion talking, and because I always make it awkward," Marie said.

 "Ah. I know that feel," Pearl said. "I kept fucking it up when I was trying to confess to Marina too, you know."

 Marie did a double-take. "Wait, you and Marina are a couple?"

 "Yeah, we just don't talk about it in the public eye. Try to avoid creeps, you know?" Pearl said. "It's a pretty recent thing anyways."

 "That makes sense," Marie said. "There are plenty of people who might go... overboard regarding your relationship."

 "Anyways, back to _your_ relationship," Pearl said. "Here's my advice for you: when you're about to confess, don't back down. I did it an embarrassing number of times, looking back. Just… go for it when you can."

 Marie swept a hand through Four's tentacles as her head laid on the Squid Sister's lap. "I'll keep it in mind."

 

* * *

 

 Four grabbed her head as she woke up. Ow. That hurt like hell. Upon opening her eyes, she found herself not on the cold ground of the impact zone and not in her own house, but on a couch in Callie and Marie's place. Huh. Not what she had expected.

 "Four!" she heard a voice say to her left, and it was so _loud_. Four slowly turned her head towards the source of the sound. It was Marie.

 "I was afraid you weren't going to wake back up!" the Squid Sister said from her position kneeling next to the couch.

 "H-hey…" Four said with no small amount of effort.

 "What happened to you?" Marie asked.

 Four blinked a bit of blurriness out of her eyes. "I… I uh… I had to fight off a… a huge horde of saniti… sani… uh, sani… god, my head hurts..."

 "It's okay, take your time," Marie said.

 Four gently nodded and swallowed down a lump in her throat. "Uhm, green… inklings. The ink burned but I was doing okay. Then the last one… they uh… they picked up a golf club and… y'know…" She pantomimed an overhead strike. "Thanks for… thanks for patching me up."

 Marie smiled gently. "No problem. But why didn't you just retreat?"

 "I had to protect Three and octo… Eight," Four said.

 "Wait, you _found_ them?!" Marie asked.

 Four nodded.

 "Well are they okay? Are they surviving well?" Marie continued.

 "Basically," Four said. "There's something weird about Eight's past, though… she's… it's not normal, not even for octolings... I think." Four looked around the room. "Hey, how did I end up here? Did you come rescue me?"

 "No, you actually walked all the way here on your own," Marie said. "I really thought you would have gone to your own place. It's a lot closer."

 "Hm… I don't remember any of that... guess I just knew that you'd be able to take care of me," Four said, smiling.

 Marie put a hand over her heart for a second before continuing. "Y-yeah, I guess."

 "So, will Callie want to know I'm awake?" Four asked.

 Four could actually see the happiness draining from Marie's face.

 "Marie? What's wrong?"

 The Squid Sister avoided direct eye contact with the agent. "Four… about Callie…"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Four didn't die! You can all relax now!  
> ... Except Marie, who is being tortured by feelings of many kinds.  
> (One of those feelings is gay.)
> 
> Comment below with your favorite Splatoon character, or anything else you'd like me to hear. Your comments give me life!!!


	21. Chapter 21

 Eight and Three were peering out over the ocean towards Kamabo's entrance, and at the swarm of police helicopters going to and from it. It was not exactly the most comforting sight.

 "Well… that's not good…" Three said.

 "No…" Eight said, her voice downcast.

 "This doesn't make any sense... They already decided to convict you, so they shouldn't be looking for evidence to the contrary, and we clearly haven't been over there since we escaped... so why would they still be hanging out over there?" Three questioned. "And in the middle of the night, too. That's really inconvenient."

 "Maybe they found evidence that might prove my innocence?" Eight offered.

 Three chuckled. "Doubtful. They're stupid  _ and  _ racist. They're only going to listen to a counter-argument if it smacks them in the face and  _ forces _ them to acknowledge how dumb they're being."

 Eight was quiet for a moment. "... Are we still going to go over there?"

 Three tapped her foot on the sidewalk below her. "It's up to you. We can wait for the heat to disperse if you want. Fair warning though, I'm not a huge fan of waiting."

 "Then neither am I," Eight said, a determined glint in her eye. "How do we get over there?"

 "Well… by doing some more illegal stuff," Three said, to which Eight's expression sank. "Sorry. I know you probably don't like going against the rules, but it's not like we can  _ legally  _ purchase a boat right now."

 Eight nodded sadly. "I understand."

 "Cool. Let's go steal a boat," Three said.

 

* * *

 

 "It was way too easy to steal this boat," Three mumbled to herself from the speedboat's controls.

 "I hope we'll be able to return this!" Eight shouted over the sound of the engine.

 "That'd be nice, but don't count on it!" Three shouted back. She then turned the engine down a bit so that it made less noise. "Okay, stealth mode."

 The two approached the crowded barge from below and thankfully seemed to go unnoticed by the gazes of the police. From their location, Eight could hear some mumblings from some of the officers. Something about "unauthorized personnel" and how they "haven't come out yet." Strange.

 "How are we going to get past them?" Eight whispered.

 Instead of responding, Three stood up and stretched herself out. The movements had a certain majesty to them that Eight had only seen from the inkling when combat was involved. She reached behind her ear and dislodged a small electronic device.

 Eight quietly gasped. Three's limiter.

 "I'll take care of it," the inkling said as a fiery aura enveloped her. Her body zoomed into the air.

 Eight scrambled up the ladder to the top of the structure. Three might need her help, after all. But as she reached the top, it was very clear that her assistance was not necessary.

 It almost looked like a dance. A Splashdown, then a barrage of Autobombs, a Killer Wail, a Stingray. The police were in such a state of shock and awe that they barely put up any resistance. But Eight wasn't looking at them. Three was the only thing she could set her eyes on. Her motions, her passion… it was breathtaking. Incredible. Eight was filled with some foreign emotion that she didn't know what to do with but she didn't want it to stop either. Three had put her in some sort of trance that she never wanted to be free of.

 Alas, the dance eventually ended. The last policemen were splatted, and Three descended from an inkjet back to the ground. The entire area was silent now.

 "Limiter."

 "H-huh?" Eight asked.

 "Body's stiff… can't move… need my limiter," Three said, frozen in a pose on top of her massive ink pool. "It's... in my pocket."

 "Right!" Eight said, running up to her inkling companion. She took the device from Three's pocket and placed it behind the former agent's ear. Three collapsed into a more stable pose and breathed heavily.

 "Thanks," she said.

 "I should be thanking you," Eight said. "That was amazing!"

 "Eheheheh…" Three rubbed the back of her head. "It wasn't that big of a deal."

 "Are you feeling alright after all that? That was a lot of specials…"

 "I'm fine. Like I said, just some stiffness," Three responded, moving around her arm joints. She got back up to her feet. "Alright. Time for us to go in."

 Eight moved over to the entrance to Kamabo, and then she hesitated. She never thought she would be coming back here…

 Three came up behind her and put a hand on her shoulder. "You can do this."

 Eight took a deep breath, then nodded. She planted her hands and feet on the ladder, then slid down. Three followed close behind.

 They reached the elevator of the spinal phase, which did not exactly bring back good memories. In fact, a little bit of Eight's blood could still be seen stained on the floor. The octoling felt at her wound from that event. This was where this whole mess had really started. Where she had failed.

 "Aah!" Three's voice cried out.

 Eight turned to her and saw her clawing at the skin around her eye. "Three?"

 "GAAAHHHH!" Three screamed, her motions getting frantic as the pain clearly worsened.

 Eight immediately rushed to her side. "Three! How can I help you? What can I-"

 And then the octoling had her legs swept out from under her. Time seemed to slow down to a crawl once again as Eight fell towards the ground. Standing above her, staring at her, was Three, but it wasn't  _ really _ her. There was something wrong with her eyes. They were suddenly cold and unfeeling.

 Eight had seen those eyes in this elevator before.

 Three thrusted her fist at Eight's face and punched her head into the solid steel below. The octoling felt a sharp pain, and then her vision blacked out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ...
> 
> Comment if you would like.


	22. Chapter 22

 Callie violently threw the glasses off of her face. They clattered along the ground, but didn't land nearly as far away as Callie would have wanted them to. As if… she couldn't _make_ herself get rid of them.

 "No… you need to stop this Callie…" she said to herself. "You can fight this. You can keep yourself in control."

 She had no idea where she was, and barely any idea of what she'd done since super jumping away from that mansion. She was lost and scared and desperate…

  _Come on, put the shades back on, Callie! Let's have some fun!_

"Shut up! Get out of my head!" Callie shouted, clutching her forehead with both hands.

  _I can't get out of your head. I am your head. I'm your own thoughts, and you know I'm right._

 "Stop! I can't take it!" Callie cried out.

  _Of course you can't take it. You're weak on your own. That's why you put the shades on anyways. They make you stronger. You knew you would have been useless at that mansion fight without them._

Callie felt like throwing up. "Stop it, stop it! I'm in control… I'm in control…"

  _I'm sure the police you shot would disagree._

 "N-no, that wasn't… that wasn't me…"

  _Then who was it, little Miss 'in control'?_

"Please….... stop this….."

  _Ooo, this docile manner doesn't suit you. You look really lame right now._

 "I don't care, I don't care, I don't _care_!!!" Callie banged the back of her head against the wall behind her, then slid down onto the dirt.

  _Look, you know you need the shades. You've been dying to put them on ever since they were taken off of you. You need to let loose. Let the shades take over so you don't have to worry about the hard things in life. Just let it happen._

Callie was already holding the glasses without having realized she had picked them up.

 "N-no… I don't want… to hurt my friends."

  _Those aren't your friends! They hang out with you out of necessity. You know that. You know that you're nothing on your own._

Callie was silent as she stared at the ground.

  _Put the glasses on, Callie. There's no reason to fight it._

 Tears streaked down Callie's face as she reluctantly put the shades back on, and then her posture immediately straightened.

 "There we go. Much better," she said with a grin.

 

* * *

 

 "Oh. It's you."

 "Yes, it's me," Marie said with a bit of venom in her voice. "Are we going to have a problem with that?"

 "That depends. Are you just here to taunt me, inkling?" Octavio said.

 "No," Marie responded. "I'm here for some answers."

 "Don't expect me to give you any. I'm not helping you with your octarian oppression," Octavio said. "I likely wouldn't know much anyways. I'm even more secluded now than ever before."

 "We had to move your globe further into Octo Canyon a while back because of… unforeseen circumstances. Inkling society was on high alert, and we didn't want you to be found," Marie said. "You probably won't believe me, but it was for your own protection."

 "You're right. I don't believe you. Now stop wasting my precious time," Octavio said.

 "Precious? You have all the time in the world."

 Octavio glared at the Squid Sister. "The only reason I plan to listen to you is because I have been greatly deprived of social contact as of late. So make sure your questions are worth my while."

 Marie rolled her eyes, then pulled up a picture on her phone. "These mind-control glasses you made. If someone were to put them on, where would they go?"

 Octavio squinted at the picture, and then at Marie. " _Who_ put the glasses on?"

 Marie didn't want to say it, but she caved. "Callie. Callie put them back on."

 Octavio stroked his tentacled chin. "Now that _is_ interesting."

 "What is?" Marie asked. She was starting to get concerned.

 "When she put them on, she should have come straight here to free me. The glasses were made for no other purpose than to force her to serve me in destroying your filthy race," Octavio said. "But… it seems that the glasses are no longer doing that. I have no idea where she might have gone."

 Marie grit her teeth. At least Octavio was being more helpful than she thought he would be. Not that he was being _exceedingly_ helpful.

 "Then maybe you can tell me why she put them back on in the first place?" Marie said. "She had been trying to get to them for weeks, and I hadn't even realized. Why would she do that?"

 "Power, obviously. Those glasses increase the power of the person under their control. Who _wouldn't_ want that?"

 "Callie wouldn't care," Marie said.

 Octavio grunted. "Well, it's possible that the glasses have some unintended, lasting effects. They were built in a rush and tested only a few times. Maybe they are addictive in some way. That would be a happy accident for my side, if that's true!"

 Marie clenched and unclenched her fist. She was getting pissed off.

 "Just imagine- one of Inkopolis's biggest stars, well and truly corrupted," Octavio said. "That is a thought that makes me smile."

 Marie exhaled sharply through her nose. She didn't have to take this. She didn't have to take _any_ of Octavio's crap. She turned to storm away, but then she thought about something that Four had said earlier and aborted the motion.

 She turned back towards the Octarian DJ. "I have one more question."

 "Is it related to your 'Callie situation'?" Octavio asked. He seemed way too amused by the thought that Callie was lost and struggling somewhere.

"Not really. You haven't really helped at all with that," Marie said. "Do you know of an octoling who goes by the name of Eight?"

 "I don't know what kind of a name that is. Definitely not an octoling one," Octavio said, crossing his tentacles.

 "Yeah, duh," Marie said. "She lost her memory, so that's the name we call her."

 "Well then why do you expect _me_ to recognize her by that name?" Octavio glared at the inkling outside of the tank.

 "Shut up, I've got a picture," Marie said, searching her phone. She pulled up the picture of Eight that had been used in Off the Hook news broadcasts... when they had still been happening. The inkling turned her phone so the large octarian in front of her could see the image.

 "Hm. I was fully prepared to mock you for assuming that I know the face of every octarian in my army, but I actually _do_ know this one," Octavio said.

 "You do?" Marie asked.

 "Yes. She was in a… special division, you might say."

 Marie narrowed her eyes at Octavio. "I've heard from one of the agents that she had a very bad past. Is that your fault?"

 "Why would you care? Troubling past or not, you still plan to oppress any and all octolings," Octavio said.

 Marie shook her head. "While I've barely met her myself, many of the people I know have become very close to Eight. So I want to know about her past so that I can help her."

 "An octoling becoming close with inklings? No. Can't happen." Octavio said defiantly.

 "Not as long as they're still under your control. Eight broke out of it," Marie said.

 "Not _possible_!" Octavio shouted, slamming against the glass. Marie briefly reached her hand for her charger, but brought it back when she saw that the glass didn't crack.

 "Octavio, what happened to Eight when she was in your army?" Marie asked, forcefully this time.

 Octavio looked away for a moment. "... Our attempts at salvation hadn't been going well. So many years after the Great Turf Wars, we were still stuck underground." He looked even further into the distance. "They were desperate times. And I intended to solve them with desperate measures."

 Marie didn't like where this was going. There was a somberness in Octavio's voice that seemed so unlike him.

 "I created a special unit. One that was specifically geared for..." Octavio finally looked directly at Marie, "... suicide missions. Blowing up factories, performing missions outside of the range of respawn points, and sometimes even venturing into toxic areas in Octo Canyon. Things like that. Octolings were taken from their parents at birth and raised in a way that _ensured_ that they would have no value for their own lives. Beatings, deprivation, et cetera. It was important that the soldiers only had one goal- serving their race." He sighed quietly. "The octoling you call Eight… I don't know what her name was, but I do know one thing: she returned from three suicide missions. Not unscathed, but she survived. No other member in her unit survived more than one. They were nearly impossible tasks to come back from, and yet there she was every time, limping or even crawling her way back. Ready to serve again."

 A piece of construction equipment flew past Octavio's tank and was embedded into the wall behind him.

 "You bastard! You were sending your own people to their deaths!" Marie shouted, picking up another potential projectile.

 "They did it for the good of octariankind. They served their people well."

 "You used your control over them to _force_ them to march to their deaths! What kind of sick freak does that?!"

 "What kinds of sick freaks would force my hand into doing that?! This is the inklings' fault!" Octavio shouted back.

 "I always knew that you were a depraved psycho, but this officially crosses _way_ over the line," Marie said. "No wonder Eight was willing to go through a literal death trap to get away from you. You had her abused and taunted and… and nearly killed _three times_! And her mind was so twisted by your music and your indoctrination that she was willing to come back after each one! You're a monster!"

 "I had no choice! Do you know what it's like to be forced into the dark with no way out? Without the Great Zapfish, my people can't even afford to light up their homes. Inklings are to blame for this. They are responsible for every death! I will avenge those brave octolings for their sacrifices by taking back what is rightfully ours!"

 Marie shook her head and super jumped out. She couldn't take the ravings of this madman any longer.

 Upon touching down, her thoughts were blocked out by a swirl of emotions. She leaned against a wall for a moment and took some deep breaths to help clear her mind.

 She looked at the city in the distance. Somewhere, out there in Inkopolis, Three and Eight were running. Running and surviving. And, hopefully, making progress on proving Eight's innocence. Marie could only hope.

 She sighed. "Keep running out there, Eight. Once this is all over, I'll take you anywhere you want to go. Me and Callie and Three and Four… we'll teach you what it's really like to live."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And Eight's tragic past is revealed!  
> ... Yeah, maybe I should say that with a little less excitement.  
> Eight's tragic past is revealed...
> 
> Also, Callie is suffering and Marie is suffering! Oh, and Three. Don't forget Three. Oh, and Four's in horrible pain now too, and Off the Hook was betrayed by all of their fans.
> 
> Yeah... I think I was pretty accurate with the tags on this story.
> 
> Comment below with your thoughts, or if you just want to chat! No lie, every time that I get a notification about me getting a comment on this story, my heart does a little happy dance. So keep doing it!
> 
> Have a wonderful day!


	23. Chapter 23

 Eight's head was pounding as she opened her eyes. Ow. She hadn't been ready for that.

 She stood up from where she had been lying on the ground and brushed herself off. A feeling of dread pervaded her every move. Three wasn't herself. Some of that corrupting goo must've still been stuck on her. Eight needed to save her. Eight  _ really _ needed to save her.

 As the octoling frantically continued swiping dust off of her clothes, her hand brushed against something on her back. She froze, then felt at the object. It felt like a deflated balloon.

 No. Oh no no no no no NO NO NO NO. God, no. She couldn't handle this again. She tried to take the device off of her back, but it was strapped tightly onto her. She desperately tugged at the straps, but they wouldn't release her and it only served to make them feel tighter. She even tried tearing one of the shoulder straps apart with her teeth, but it was no use.

 Eight collapsed to the floor and curled up into a little ball. No… no… no…

 "Welcome back, subject number 10,008," said a voice directly into her ear. She reached to it and found that she had an earpiece there. And, after figuring that out, she started freaking out all over again over the fact that she could hear the evil telephone's voice.

 "No! You can't be here! You can't!" Eight screamed.

 "Your logic is flawed. I still have every reason to be in this place," Tartar said through the earpiece. "It was foolish of you to come back here after foiling my flawless plan."

 Eight clenched her fists and uncurled herself on the floor. She needed to keep a level head. She needed to stay calm. "... Why didn't you just kill me, then?"

 "The humans who created me molded my processing to resemble their minds, and humans seemed to have a propensity for revenge," Tartar said. "It came to my attention that you greatly disliked the tests that you were put through in this metro. As such, I have created a grandiose, extremely challenging test specifically for the sake of your suffering. Please acknowledge that this test took quite a bit of effort to make, so it deserves some appreciation."

 "No. I'm not doing another one of those tests. Never again," Eight said. She struggled to keep herself from breaking down and crying.

 "Then you consign the inkling that you traveled with to a certain death," Tartar said.

 Eight gasped. Three. "Where are you keeping her?"

 "The inkling will be accessible after passing the test," Tartar declared. "Normally I would not be able to control its body considering how little of my essence still resides in it. However, it was shockingly easy due to the inkling having worn itself very thin."

 Three… she wasn't okay. But Eight wasn't planning to let that last. All she had to do… was pass one last test. One last murderous mission.

 She tried to stand up, but her fear had her completely frozen in place. No. She had to do this. To save Three. She forced herself to move.

 "Enjoy, Number 10,008," Tartar said, before its voice fizzled out of the earpiece.

 Eight finally took stock of her surroundings now that there was nothing distracting her. She was in one of the metro stops, minus any sign of the metro train itself. But there was a hole punched in the wall, which seemed to be where Eight was supposed to go. She didn't want to, but Three needed to be saved.

 Eight stepped through the hole and over a respawn point into a room absolutely slathered in green ink. There were a few distant spaces that were not covered in the substance, but they were tiny and infrequent.

 The earpiece turned on once again with Tartar's voice. "Your objective: reach the end without touching enemy ink."

 Eight's eyes widened. Seriously? She looked around for a weapon dispenser and found none. She had to do this without being able to cover up any ink. That was… insane. Impossible, even. But… she didn't really have the luxury of avoiding the challenge.

 She took a breath, broke into a dash, and then jumped as far as she could towards the nearest blank spot.

 She didn't make it.

 "You touched enemy ink. Test failed."

 Eight closed her eyes and mentally prepared herself. The balloon on her back inflated, then popped with green ink. And god, it hurt just as much as Eight remembered it.

 And then she emerged from the respawn point, her lower back burning. She sucked some air through her teeth to try and distract herself from the pain.

 "I'm sure you don't understand how much trouble your incompliance caused me," Tartar's voice said in her ear. "After your allies hindered my original attack, I have had to lower the standards for the creation of new ammunition for my weapon."

 Eight shook her head and made a running leap.

 "You touched enemy ink. Test failed," Tartar said, and continued speaking over Eight's explosion. "My new batch of ooze has had to be made from even more incompetent lifeforms. Failed metro residents and pre-sanitized creatures had to be used. I even had to stoop so low as to use some unintelligent salmon-like creatures that were harvesting resources nearby. They were cowardly, as well. Many fled as soon as they saw what I was doing to their comrades."

 Eight landed in ink and braced herself. Somehow this explosion felt even more painful.

 "Finally, finally I accrued enough organic matter to launch a final attack, and then you just happen to show your face again," Tartar said. "I suppose you plan to thwart my plans once more."

 "I didn't thwart your plans in the first place! I failed!" Eight shouted.

 "It is true that you did not deal the final blow, but do not try to fool me," Tartar said. " _ You _ were the focal point of the entire effort to stop my attack. All of your allies were fighting against me because of you. You brought them together, and  _ you _ are the reason I did not fully succeed."

 "Please, shut up!" Eight lashed out. This thing's voice was wrecking her concentration.

 There was a pause over the line.

 "... Very well," Tartar said, and the earpiece turned off.

 Eight sighed in relief. Now she could focus.

 *Splat*

 God, that hurt so much.

 *Splat*

 She just couldn't make the jump.

 *Splat*

 Okay, okay. Eight had to stop and think about this. She clearly couldn't make it with a jump, and continuing to try was just leading to more pain. Slow down and think… what were her options?

 The walls didn't look remotely climbable, so that was a bust. And she had no way of spreading her own ink, so… was this really it?

 Wait. She had an idea.

 She stepped to a few different places and looked at the gap through a frame she made with her hands. She then made some estimations on a few angles and walked as close to the green ink as she could without getting herself splatted. Then she turned into octopus form and super jumped at the ceiling. She hit her head  _ so  _ hard on the metal surface, but her remaining velocity was enough to carry her onto the blank spot.

 Eight clutched her head and stumbled, but managed to keep herself from falling out of the tiny spot of safety. Ouch. Ow, ow, ow. Now just about every part of her body was in pain, especially her head. This was worse than the last time she was in the metro, and this time there was no illusion of a promised land to keep her going.

 But there was Three, and that was all the motivation she needed.

 Eight balanced herself, then launched another super jump straight at the ceiling. Pain coursed through her cartilaginous skull, but she refused to give in to it as she landed at the next safe space. One more good jump to go.

 And she didn't hesitate this time. Launch, smash skull, land. And she was at the end of the room.

 She wanted to celebrate, but the entire world was spinning. Spinning and spinning and her head felt like there was a screwdriver being stabbed into it. She felt like she was going to be sick. She felt that very strongly. In fact, she was definitely going to be sick.

 Eight braced her forehead and palms against a wall and focused heavily on her breathing to try and stop the world's swirling. It was helping to quell her nausea a little bit, but not much.

 Then her earpiece turned on once again, to Eight's dismay. That telephone's voice was not going to help her feel better.

 But to her surprise, she heard a groan on the other end.

 "Ungh… fuck….."

 Eight's eye's widened. "Three?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hahahaha. HAHAHAHA. HA!
> 
> Eight's not okay.
> 
> I enjoy your comments. Give me MORE!


	24. Chapter 24

 "Three?"

 "Ughh….. Eight? Is that you...?"

 "Oh my gosh, you're okay!" Eight jumped for joy, and then immediately stopped due to how concussed she was.

 "Y-yeah, I guess…" Three said over the earpiece. "I mean, I'm a little… restrained to a wall, so that's not great." Then she paused. "Oh my god, I just remembered what happened. Eight, I'm so sorry! I got you trapped in here again! Are you okay?!"

 "Mostly," Eight said, rubbing her aching head.

 "Eight, find a way out of there and get out as soon as you can. Don't worry about me, I'm dead weight at this point. In fact, I'm an actual hazard. That damn phone can take me over whenever he feels like it. Just stay away from me and escape."

 "No."

 Three paused. "Wh- Eight-"

 "I'm not leaving you here!" Eight shouted. "Not after everything you've gone through to keep me safe! I'm going to get you out."

 "Eight, you're not listening! Last time I was under control I almost killed you. I don't want that to happen again!"

 "Shut up!" Eight retorted. It was very unlike her to say something like that, but Three needed to understand. "I don't care about the risks, I don't care about how much it will take to get to you. I just care about you!"

 Three was shocked into silence, and in that time Eight started moving again to her next task. As she entered the next room, the earpiece crackled again.

 "Your task in this room: survive," Tartar said, before his voice went away again.

 Eight looked around the room. Survive? Survive what?

 "Wait, task? Is that thing making you run tests again?" Three asked.

 "Yes," Eight said.

 "But… those tests were torture!"

 "I don't care," Eight said.

 "Eight… are you sure about this?" Three asked. She sounded more meek than usual.

 "Absolutely."

 Eight stepped a little more into the room, and all hell broke loose. Sanitized octarians of every shape and size emerged from the walls and rained corrupted ink everywhere.

 Eight reached for an Octoshot that wasn't there. Oh right. She was completely unarmed. That was… bad.

 "What's happening?" Three asked. "Eight, what's going on?"

 "I'm sorry, not now, Three," Eight said. She needed to focus. She dashed around the room, avoiding ink splatters as best she could. She dodged, weaved and-"

 *Splat*

 She came back out of a respawn point, still feeling the burning of the ink that had been covering her. That was insane. There was so much… too much…

 She looked in front of her. She was back in the ink room. She was going to have to do all of this all over again.

 "Eight! Are you okay?"

 "I'm fine," Eight said.

 "... Okay," Three said. "Eight, you've gotta tell me what's happening over there."

 "That was a room completely filled with sanitized octarians," Eight said. "And I just respawned, so now I have to do the first challenge again."

 "What's the first challenge?"

 "I'm going to have to bludgeon myself in the head a lot," Eight said. She meant to say it in a joking, lighthearted fashion, but Three didn't take it that way.

 "Eight, what the fuck! No, there has to be another way!"

 "Sorry, there isn't," Eight said, and then initiated her first super jump. She banged her head and landed. And she was dizzy once again.

 "Eight, I heard that! Please stop!" Three shouted, sounding like she was struggling against her restraints.

 "Not until you're free," the octoling said, and then she super jumped into the roof again.

 "You're  _ hurting  _ yourself! I'm not worth that!" Three pleaded.

 Eight didn't respond. She just super jumped for the third time, bonked, and landed. Then she collapsed.

 "Eight. Eight, are you hearing me? You have to stop!" Three protested in her ear, but Eight could hardly muster the energy to respond. Black specks darted around in her vision, and she had a very compelling urge to go unconscious right where she was.

 "Eight? Are you okay?" Three asked.

 The test subject shook herself. There was a job that needed doing. Now was not the time for sleeping. She shakily got to her feet.

 "I'm fine," Eight said.

 "I don't believe you," Three said.

 Eight walked into the second room, and it was once again empty. That was, until she crossed a certain threshold. Then the walls all flipped to release the horde of sanitized abominations. Eight was more prepared for it this time, but it didn't help her that much. She dodged as best she could, but she kept taking glancing blows of ink. The damage added up, and in the end she was splatted once again.

 Eight popped out of the respawn point and clutched herself in agony. That one was still stinging.

 "Eight," Three said over the earpiece.

 Eight ignored her and performed the first super jump. The sound of her head hitting the metal reverberated throughout the room.

 "Eight."

 She jumped again. Bang.

 "Eight, please!" Three sounded more desperate this time.

 Eight banged her head one more time, and she was at the end of the room. She clutched her bruised and bleeding tentacles.

 "Please, I can't take this! I can't take you hurting yourself! Please… please don't do this…"

 This time it gave Eight pause. Was Three… crying?

 "Three?"

 "Eight…. I can't do this… hearing you getting so hurt is killing me…" Three sobbed. "Please… find another way… leave me here… I'm not worth this…"

 "I can't, Three," Eight said. "You deserve to be let out of this place."

 "Eight, I probably care more about you than anyone else on this planet. You know that?" Three said. "I can't take this… Not being able to save you from this hellhole is the worst feeling in the world because you've become so important to me."

 Eight felt that bubbly feeling again, and her heartbeat sped up.

 "Three…" Eight said. "I-I feel the same way about you, and that's why I have to do this. I have to get you out. Even if I could get out on my own, I don't want to live a life on the surface without you there."

 Three was silent for a bit before speaking up. "... So there's nothing I can do to convince you to stop?"

 "I'm sorry, no," Eight said, determined.

 Three sighed. "Then let's focus on getting you through that next room so you don't have to do this all over again."

 Eight smiled and started stepping towards the door. Then she lost her balance and started heaving on the ground.

 "Eight? Are you okay?" Three asked.

 "Yeah," Eight said, getting back to her feet. This head trauma was doing weird things to her. She stepped into the next room, but not far enough to activate the assault.

 "Alright, in this next room a lot of sanitized octarians show up. I don't have a gun, so I don't know how to take care of them," Eight said.

 "No gun…?" Three said. "Hmmm… well if that phone doesn't plan on giving you a fair chance, then why should you follow his rules? It's time for you to start fighting dirty."

 Fighting dirty, huh?

 Eight stepped forward and activated the onslaught. Ink started flying and Eight had to be very careful to avoid it. She didn't have any weapon to fight back with, just like before.

 Or maybe she hadn't been factoring in the fact that  _ she _ could be the weapon.

 Eight ran up to a corrupted octoling, grabbed its gun, and roundhouse kicked it in the face. The sanitized octoling went limp on the ground, and Eight ripped the ink pack off of its back and put it on. And now she was armed.

 Eight made ink trails left and right to swim through and started taking down the enemies one by one. It wasn't easy by any definition of the word, but it was working. She chipped away at all of the sanitized octarians, occasionally even adding martial arts of her own. She was actually making great headway.

 Or she was, until the walls started flipping open with even more sanitized octarians.

 "What?!" Eight said out loud.

 "What? What's happening?" Three asked.

 "There are even more. I got rid of so many, but they've all been replaced…" Eight said dejectedly, before sidestepping an ink splatter.

 "Shit… fuck..." Three said.

 Eight didn't know how much longer she could do this. She knew she couldn't make it through another wave. She was exhausted and her head was throbbing. She couldn't make it through this.

_ Well if that phone doesn't plan on giving you a fair chance, then why should you follow his rules? _

 The red-tentacled octoling's eyes widened as she saw another sanitized octoling emerge from the wall. Eight was in motion in the blink of an eye. She ducked and jumped around corrupted ink, slid under the legs of the octoling that had just entered, and leapt through the opening in the wall just before it closed. Then she ran and ran, refusing to stop until her legs gave out, and then she laid face-up on the floor. She was in some sort of a lab now, behind-the-scenes. And that meant that she had escaped the test.

 Eight giggled hysterically. She did it. If she traveled through here, she was sure she could find Three without having to go through the telephone's torture simulations. She was home free.

 "What's going on? Why are you laughing?" Three asked.

 "I escaped! I got out of the test! Now I can come find you!" Eight cheered.

 "You got out of bounds?" Three asked.

 "Yeah! I did!" Eight said with a genuine smile on her face.

 "Eight, you did it!" Three cheered. "I'm so prou-"

 And then the inkling's voice cut out.

 "Three?" Eight called, tapping on her earpiece.

 "Return to the test area, 10,008," Tartar's voice came through.

 Eight's body jolted upright immediately. "No! No. I refuse."

 "I established the voice connection with your inkling ally in order to motivate you to continue the testing," Tartar said. "It seems that it has had the adverse effect. Return to the test or I will not re-engage your contact."

 "Die in a fire," Eight said, and then she did something that she should have done a long time ago: she took the earpiece out of her ear, dropped it onto the ground, and stamped it to pieces. That felt good.

 Eight took a second to catch her breath, then grabbed some scissors from a lab table and cut the bomb off of her back. Free at last. With renewed motivation, she continued her trek to find Three.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yay! Eight got out of the test! Surely nothing could go wrong now!
> 
> Sorry this one took a while. I just... got lazy with the uploading. Feel free to comment your thoughts, and the next chapter should come out soon!


	25. Chapter 25

 Marie pounded her fists against her desk. Nothing. No lead on where Callie was. She was just… gone. Marie had already looked into several potential leads that ended up going nowhere. Collapse at a construction site? Bust. Four missing engineers? Seemed to be another bust. Grizzco increasing its shifts? Not even close. She had nothing to go off of anymore. She was just… lost.

 She sighed and stood from her chair. She was too frustrated to do anything productive, just like how Callie got sometimes. Marie resolved herself to taking a walk around Octo Canyon to clear her mind. But on the way out, she heard something coming from the bathroom. Marie didn't like to pry (okay, yeah, she did), but when she realized that it was Agent Four's voice, she couldn't resist. In fact, was Four… singing?

 Marie leaned against the wall to hear better. Yep. She was singing in the shower. And not just any song- she was singing Calamari Inkantation. It was… mesmerizing, and not just in the way that the song usually was. The fact that it was Four singing it made it all the more incredible.

 

* * *

 

 Four staggered out of the bathroom humming the end of the song, but froze when she saw Marie leaning next to the door.

 "H-how long have you been there?" Four asked, blushing profusely as she supported her weight on the wall.

 "Long enough to hear you sing our song a couple of times," Marie said, smirking. "Why didn't you tell me you could sing?"

 "I can't, really…" Four said.

 "Shut up, that was great!" Marie said.

 Four fidgeted and looked away. "I-I started singing because I liked a bunch of idols, but I had a music teacher that made it pretty clear that I wasn't any good. I… don't usually like for people to hear my singing voice."

 "Four," Marie said, putting a hand on the agent's shoulder, "that music teacher was a bitch. Don't listen to a word they said. You're really good! I might be biased, but you sounded excellent singing Calamari Inkantation there."

 Four kicked her foot at the ground. "If you say so… I… I just really like how that song sounds…"

 "Well thank you," Marie said, taking her hand back off of the younger inkling's shoulder. "It took a lot of work to get it that way."

 Four nodded slowly. "... Hey, if we're going to keep talking, can I put some clothes on?"

 Oh yeah. Marie didn't even register the fact that Four was standing in the hallway in just a towel.

 "Yeah, that's probably a good idea. I'll be outside," Marie said before stepping out. Maybe some fresh air would help with the heat rising in her face.

 

* * *

 

 Four came limping out of the cabin at a bad time. Marie had been sitting and waiting on a ledge, and her mind was wandering, and then she started thinking about Callie and… well, then she got depressed.

 "Whoa, what's wrong?" Four asked after noticing Marie's dejected expression. The shorter inkling plopped down next to her.

 The Squid Sister sighed. "... I can't find Callie. I just… can't. The fact that I can't show my face in public without the police cracking down on me definitely doesn't help but… she's totally off the grid."

 "Don't worry, you'll find her. You're really smart, Marie," Four said.

 "But what if I can't?" Marie asked, distressed. "Last time we were lucky to rescue her after not too long a time of being captured, but what if we can't find her for weeks or even months this time? What would those glasses do to her? We don't even know what their objective is anymore, because it's clearly not 'serving the octarians'. She could be doing anything! Be anywhere! I just… I can't…"

 "Don't you dare say you can't," Four said, standing up and shocking Marie into silence. "You are the most capable person I've ever met. You're basically a genius, you're strong, and you never give up. You're not a quitter, Marie."

 "Four… I've been trying. I've got no leads this time."

 "Then what does your gut say? Point me in a direction and I'll follow it to the end," Four said. "Marie, we are  _ going _ to get Callie back! That's a promise!"

 "You… sound really passionate about this," Marie commented.

 "It's because I can't stand seeing you hurting like this," Four said. She grabbed both of Marie's hands, and the Squid Sister let herself be pulled up into a standing position. Four made intense eye contact now that they were standing close to each other. "I can't stand  _ anyone  _ hurting, but especially not you. The world is too full of unhappy people. I don't want you to have to be one of them."

 And there it was. There was the reason Marie had fallen for this inkling. Her kindness was unrivaled. Her drive to make people smile… Marie felt like she was falling in love with her all over again.

 "... Four..." Marie said. "... Hey, is it okay if I ask you something?"

 "Yeah?" Four responded. She still hadn't let go of Marie's hands.

 "You woke up once, briefly, while I was treating you. Do you remember that?" Marie asked.

 "Uhh… no, sorry," Four said.

 "That's alright. You asked me a question while you were conscious, and I'm going to repeat that question to you," Marie said. She leaned in closer. "Can I kiss you?"

 Four's face lit up yellow. "D-did I actually say that?"

 Marie smiled. "You did. And, if it's okay with you, I'd like to give you my answer."

 Four still looked embarrassed and really nervous, but she didn't resist as Marie leaned in. Their lips touched in the middle, and it wasn't what Marie had expected. There was so much rhetoric about kisses feeling like sparks or fireworks, being powerful and overwhelming. With Four, though, the kiss was calm and just made Marie feel safe. It was exactly what she wanted and everything she needed. They both pushed into it, and held each other close.

 Eventually they parted, and they both had smiles on their faces.

 "I've been wanting to do that for so long," Marie said.

 "Y-you have?" Four asked. She was still a little flustered.

 "Yes," Marie said. "Four, I like you. I like you  _ a lot _ . I'd love to be your girlfriend, if you'd have me."

 "Absolutely!" Four said, regaining some of her normal peppiness. She calmed down a bit after that, though. "By the way, my real name isn't Four."

 "Of course I know that," Marie said, rolling her eyes with a smile. "Though I don't think I ever caught your real name."

 Four leaned in really close to the Squid Sister's ear before whispering her answer. Marie reveled in the closeness that came from this intimate exchange. It was just a name, but it felt like so much more.

 Four leaned away again. "So yeah. That's my name."

 Marie nodded, cupping Four's cheek with a hand and rubbing at the edge of a corrupted ink burn with her thumb. "Do you want me to call you that?"

 Four shook her head lightly before leaning into Marie's touch. "Nah. I like how you say 'Four'. It kinda feels more personal somehow."

 Marie stared into the agent's beautiful eyes. "Four it is, then."

 Four's expression got a little more serious, though she didn't shy away from her new girlfriend's touch. "Marie, we're going to get Callie back. And while we're at it we'll get Three and Eight back, too. I want them all to hear the good news."

 Marie didn't have a shred of sadness left in her right now. Right now it felt like everything was going to work out alright. She had Four, and Four had her.

 "I'd like that. I'd like that a lot," Marie said.

 

* * *

 

 "Pearlie, why are you looking out the window with binoculars?" Marina asked.

 "Because I'm snoopy and I'm likin' what I'm seeing," Pearl responded with a proud grin, pressing the binoculars even closer against the glass.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ooooooooooo! Romance! One of the ships is now officially together! Congrats, Marie and Four!
> 
> I'd like to add that both of the main ships of this story can be called Agent 24. Because 3 x 8 = 24, and also because Agent 2 and Agent 4 just got together. Y'know, just wanted to point that out to make things confusing.
> 
> Comment! Do it! Or else.... something mildly inconveniencing will happen to you! Yeah!


	26. Chapter 26

 Being in this lab area felt so freeing in comparison to the linear testing areas. Eight didn't have any tacked-on objectives or absurd missions. All she had was one goal: make it to the end. Make it to Three.

 Along the way, something caught her eye on one of the lab tables. A CQ-80. Eight examined it, even going so far as to look at the serial number. It wasn't just any CQ-80, it was  _ hers _ . This was the CQ-80 she had spent so long traveling the metro with and then had left behind in exchange for Three's upgraded version. It seemed that Kamabo had decided to reclaim it.

 Eight picked up the device, and it felt familiar in her hands. What wasn't familiar, however, was the fact that the camera flashed directly in her face when she did so. She dropped the whole thing immediately. That was a stupid idea. This was all too coincidental. What if that phone had put a tracking chip in that specific CQ-80 so that he could find her? No, Eight wouldn't fall for that. She left the device behind.

 Thankfully she came across a room packed full of the upgraded CQ-80s soon after. After (carefully) selecting one, she felt much more in control. Now she had a map, and a good idea of where she was going. And now she could stop wasting time with wandering around and get straight to releasing Three.

 Except… wait… on the map... did that say "containment room"? That definitely wasn't where Three was being held- it didn't make sense in relation to the testing chambers. So… was the phone keeping other prisoners? She vaguely remembered it mentioning that it had started using metro passengers for the goop, and that was… an unpleasant image. But if any of them were still alive…

 Eight desperately wished that she could still talk to Three. At least then she wouldn't have to make this decision all on her own. Did she go save Three as fast as she could, or take a detour and assist whoever might still be a hostage? She really didn't want to risk Three not making it out…

 Eight shook her head. No. Whoever else was in here deserved to make it out. Eight was going to make sure of that. She was sure Three would make the same decision. She headed towards the containment room.

 It wasn't a particularly long walk, but the silence made it feel a little eerie. She arrived at the doorway and opened it up.

 And she was immediately disappointed.

 The room was empty, save for a few crates towards the back and a small glass cage in the center. And in that cage was a blue sea cucumber.

 "10,008! You're here!" C.Q. Cumber said, his voice muffled by the box. "Help me get out of here, please!"

 Eight didn't make any moves for a moment. She was finding herself extremely conflicted. She certainly wanted to be the hero, but the images of her being exploded repeatedly kept flashing in her head. She couldn't shake the spark of detestment she felt when looking at the conductor.

 "Where are the other passengers?" Eight asked, a bit of a bite to her voice.

 "Gone. Every single one of them," C.Q. said. "Tartar said that it was sparing me in return for serving it so well, but I never wanted this! I just wanted to run my train!"

 And now Eight was even more conflicted, because what if he was lying and he was actually still working for the phone? This could all be a trap. C.Q. could sell her out the moment it suited him.

 … But it left a bad taste in Eight's mouth to condemn him to this place. She reluctantly trudged towards the cage.

 "I didn't know how much suffering was happening right under my nose. So many bodies…" C.Q. said.

 "And pain," Eight said. "Remember, you were the one who kept pressing the button to explode the test subjects."

 "Pain?" C.Q. sounded confused. "That wasn't supposed to hurt. It's just ink!"

 "Not normal ink," Eight said. She showed her back to the conductor. The bandages that had been there had been almost completely ripped off by the newest explosions, exposing the nasty wounds still lasting there as well as the new ones that were sure to leave even bigger scars.

 "Oh-oh my…" C.Q. said. "I never knew…"

 "You should have known," Eight said a little spitefully as she turned back to the cage and started trying to find a way to open it. It felt wrong to help one of the people who hurt her the most, but she had to put that aside for now.

 "10,008, look out!"

 And all of a sudden Eight was flying through the air after getting hit hard from the side. Thankfully there wasn't a wall nearby so she was able to gracefully land into a slide, but her side still ached from the initial impact. She looked at her attacker, and her heart sank.

 It was a crustacean with multiple sets of arms and a now-green, sanitized shell. He looked at Eight through his round glasses, no doubt with glazed-over eyes underneath.

 "No… Iso Padre…" Eight said. She couldn't believe it. Not him. He had wanted to make it to Inkopolis too... Why did this have to happen to him? "Iso Padre, please… snap out of it!"

 Padre charged at Eight again, clearly with the intent to harm. Eight leapt out of the way, just barely in time to avoid him.

 "Iso Padre, please! I don't want to fight you!"

 The isopod charged again, swiping with his arms. Eight dodged again, but nearly fell over afterwards. She was so tired…

 … Who was she kidding? She knew Padre was already gone. The sanitization process had removed him entirely, leaving him as an empty shell filled only with cruel intentions. Eight reluctantly raised her Shooter.

 Iso charged again, but this time he met resistance. Eight closed her eyes and unloaded into the sanitized remains of the metro resident. She heard a splat, then opened her eyes to see only a splatter of ink remaining. She didn't even know if he would be able to respawn due to him not being a cephalopod. Either way, the Iso Padre she had known was gone.

 "It's a shame, really," C.Q., the person that Eight wanted to hear the least right now, said. "He was a kind person. He always was gentle and friendly with the newer applicants."

 "Shut up! Don't you talk about him! He might have been on the surface if it weren't for you!" Eight shouted with tears prickling at the corners of her eyes. She normally wouldn't have snapped like that, but she was distraught at the moment and was tired of being given the short end of the stick.

 "... I know…" C.Q. said, genuine sorrow in his voice. "I've allowed some terrible things to occur… I have a lot that I'm going to have to make up for."

 Eight sighed, wiped the corners of her eyes, then grabbed the cage the conductor was in and lifted with all her might. It turned out it was just a weighted, overturned glass box, and C.Q. was able to crawl his way out as she kept it held open. After he was free, Eight dropped the box back down. Oh, she was so tired…

 "Well…" she wheezed for air, "I hope you manage to do that. Make up for it, I mean." She looked down at her CQ-80. "Make your way to the exit to the surface. There shouldn't be much in the way of resistance on the way there, so you should be safe. I'm not done here yet, though. Don't wait for me."

 "Pardon me if I'm being rude, but haven't you done enough? You look exhausted," C.Q. said.

 Eight looked at the splatter on the ground. "I'm not giving up. I don't want to lose another friend." Then she ran back into the laboratory corridors.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Anybody want uhhhhhh new chapter?
> 
> Because, as you can tell, I'm always willing to give Eight some more distress.
> 
> Comment if you wish, otherwise you're a... fish? That rhyme fell apart on me...


	27. Chapter 27

 Finally. Eight had reached it. Three was just on the other side of this wall.

 … Eight just had to figure out how to get _through_ an industrial strength metal wall. Three's prison room was only meant to be accessed via the testing rooms, and there was no _way_ that Eight was going to go back in there. So she had to find a workaround.

 She looked to the lab around her. The testing chamber had clearly been hastily built, so the desks near the dividing wall were askew and just about everything was knocked over. Including… a fire extinguisher.

 That was perfect. It looked like a pressurized model, so if it was jarred too much it would explode. Well, not explode exactly, but have a container failure comparable to an explosion. There were various chemicals around the lab, many of which seemed like they could be triggered into a chain reaction. A combustion of that size could easily punch a hole in metal of that thickness.

 Why did she know so much about blowing up buildings? She shrugged the thought off. What was important now was getting to Three.

 She set up a pile of barrels, vials and tubs of volatile materials near the wall, then placed the fire extinguisher a short distance away. Finally, she gave the wall a few knocks. Hopefully that would warn Three of what was about to happen.

 Eight backed up to a safe-ish distance, shot the extinguisher a few times, and then dove under cover and sheltered her ears.

 *Bang*

 * **BOOM** *

 Eight peeked out, and it seemed that she had been right. The wall had a hole just big enough for her to get through in octopus form, which she promptly did. Whatever weird knowledge she had lingering in her head from the octarian army had served her well.

 "Eight!" Three shouted from her place dangling from a chain attached to the ceiling. She was beaming.

 "Three!" Eight shouted back. Despite how exhausted she was, she couldn't help but return a similar smile.

 "W-when your radio feed cut out I didn't know what happened! I thought you might've been…" Three shook her head. "But you made it! I'm so happy you made it!"

 Eight started tearing up. This was all about to be behind them. She didn't care what happened when they came back out. She didn't care if she was locked up forever by the police. She just wanted to be out of this place, and she was about to achieve that.

 The octoling spotted an ink switch on the right side of the room and covered it in red. Upon its activation, Three was lowered to the ground and the chains around her loosened. A weird expression took over her face, and then she broke into a run towards Eight, wrapping her arms around the octoling in a tight hug.

 And then Three did something unexpected. She locked her lips with Eight's.

 The octoling had no idea what this was, but something about it felt so right. It was a spectacular feeling, having her lips pressed against Three's. And so she embraced it. She leaned further in and let her eyes slip closed for a moment.

 When she opened her eyes again, a telephone was raising from the floor behind Three.

 Eight's eyes widened and she tried to pull away from the inkling, but Three was holding her too tight. She didn't see the impending doom behind her.

 "Three, behind you!" Eight spoke after prying her lips away.

 And then Three's grip tightened, to a painful extent. No no no. Oh no.

 Three hadn't been tenderly holding her. She'd been restraining her.

 "Three… no….. snap… out…" Eight said, barely able to breathe. Three's blank but somehow hateful expression showed that Eight's pleas had no effect.

 "Subject 10,008, you and your allies are a pesky bunch," Tartar said. "As such, I needed to devise a plan to stop all of you from interfering. Even though you tried to cheat it, the result is still the same."

 Some green goop started coming out of the corner of Three's eye and squirming its way towards Eight's face. She struggled with everything she had left.

 No no no no no don't, get away, don't touch-

 "I need to stop those allies of yours before I can launch my attack, and you and this inkling specimen will be integral to that," Tartar said.

 The green goop reached Three's cheek, then started stretching the gap towards Eight.

 Please don't. Please, please, please don't do this, no no stop-

 "To maintain your outward appearances, I must use a minimal amount of my essence. Thankfully it will be equally as effective if the host is extremely worn out," Tartar said. "That is why I created the test for you, after all."

 The goop touched the skin below Eight's eye, and she suddenly had a vivid understanding of the pain that Three went through every time that she had an eye ache.

 Stop it please ow no please please no it hurts IT HURTS-

 "Your allies are likely searching for you, so you will both reveal yourselves to them. They will come to help you, and then you will kill them. Then and only then will I be free to destroy Inkopolis."

 The goop made contact with Eight's eye and the pain was mind-numbing. Tears poured out of her eyes and she couldn't stop herself from sobbing.

 Please….. Please…….

 And then there was an explosion. A big one. Way bigger than the one Eight had used to get in. And it happened right where Tartar was posted, knocking it off of its stand and into a gooey mess on the floor.

 The goop on Eight's face became limp and slid to the floor, releasing Eight from the horrible, blinding pain. Three, at the same time, doubled over and clutched her eye.

 And through the new hole in the wall came a ragged-looking Captain Cuttlefish.

 "That'll teach you to mess with my agents," he said, leveling his ink pistol at the telephone that was spasming on the ground.

 "Craig!" Eight cheered, though it lacked some energy due to the octoling not having any left to give. "How… how did you know we were here?"

 Cuttlefish tapped a Kamabo-brand earpiece in his ear. "Been listening the whole time. All it took was finding a map and I was home free." He leaned on his cane, which looked like it was on the verge of snapping. "You would not believe how much trouble I had to go through in this damned metro."

 "I understand perfectly," Eight said. She then bent down to Three's level. "Three, are you okay?"

 "O-ow…" the inkling said meekly, still covering her eye.

 Eight helped her stand up. "We're almost out. Three, we're about to be free."

 Some gurgling brought everyone's attention back to the writhing mass on the floor.

 "Y-y-you… will not succeed! I can still- I can still-"

 "Ah, shut up you bucket of rust and guts," Cuttlefish said. "Here, I found something out about you." The elder inkling gestured for Eight to keep an eye on Tartar before heading into the lab he had exploded in from. Eight used her arm that wasn't supporting Three to aim her Octoshot at the telephone.

 Then Craig came back in, holding a pitcher of something.

 "What is-" Tartar started, and then started making screeching noises as Cuttlefish poured some liquid onto it. The whole mass of goop froze solid.

 "Liquid Nitrogen. Not so scary when you're an ice cube, are you?" Cuttlefish taunted. There was no response from the petrified AI.

 "Craig… thank you… so much…" Eight said with no shortage of difficulty.

 "Don't thank me yet," Cuttlefish said, putting his pistol away. "We still have to get out of here and get _you_ proven innocent." The man picked the frozen Tartar up. "This piece of junk should help with that second bit."

 Eight nodded wearily. "Now we… just need to escape." She looked to the inkling at her side, who was still covering her eye. "Do you think you can walk?"

 "... Yeah. Yeah, I can walk," Three said. "Eight… y-you saved me. Thank you."

 "I barely did anything. Craig is the one who saved us in the end," Eight said.

 "No, Eight," Three said. "I m-mean, I appreciate his help, as usual, but… do you honestly think he could have gotten anywhere if you hadn't been that phone's main focus?"

 Eight shrugged and nodded. She supposed she _had_ done that much.

 "Just... take my appreciation and let's go," Three said. She was avoiding eye contact. Why? Was it because of what had happened while Tartar was in control of her?

 "Alright," Eight said. "Let's… go."

 The three cephalopods walked through the large explosion hole and through several labs. Eight started seeing little black specks in her vision, and she didn't know if they were leftovers from the head trauma or if they were from the exhaustion. She looked down at her CQ-80. It was a _long_ way to the exit…

 The three stepped out of one of the labs and into another metro station. It was about to be just another room they passed through, but then a noise caught their attention. Three's Hero Shot was out in an instant, and Eight's Octo Shot didn't take much longer. It was a screeching noise, getting closer and closer…

 The train came to a gradual stop in front of them, and then its doors creaked open. C.Q., now with his usual hat on, waved to them.

 "I thought that you might want some transportation," the conductor said.

 Three rolled her sleeves up and approached him. "You little fuck!"

 Eight grabbed Three by the back of the vest. "Three, please stop, it's okay. I let him out of Tartar's containment."

 "No, it's not okay," Three said. She glared at C.Q., her right eye a little more squinted than the other. "Did you blow her up with that ink bomb? Are you the one who was doing it?"

 C.Q.'s head tilted towards the ground. "... Yes. But-"

 Three was already struggling. "Eight, let me go! I have to hurt him!"

 "Three, please don't!" Eight pleaded, and then the inkling stopped struggling and just huffed a bit. Eight came in front of her and gave a patient smile. "I'm letting him have a second chance. You should too."

 "I think he's had plenty of chances, but… fine," Three said, averting her eyes from Eight's face.

 Cuttlefish cleared his throat. "So you'll take us to the exit?" he asked.

 "As close as the tracks will go," C.Q. said. He either recovered from his fear of Three quickly or was concealing it well.

 "Great!" Cuttlefish said. He walked into the train, collapsed into a seat, and placed the frozen Tartar on the floor. Eight and Three filed in after him, sitting beside each other on a bench across from the elder inkling.

 The train started moving gradually as C.Q. controlled it. "It is going to be a bit of a ride," he said. "Please make yourselves comfortable."

 Eight certainly planned to do that. She leaned her head on Three's shoulder and closed her eyes. As soon as she did this, Three's body froze up.

 … Right. Eight forgot that she wasn't supposed to do that. She was about to sit back up, but Three's body started to relax and she leaned her head on top of Eight's. Feeling this, Eight let herself relax again and once again closed her eyes.

 "Go ahead and rest, you two. There's no doubt you've earned it," Cuttlefish said.

 And the inkling and octoling fell asleep together.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Did somebody ask for some more suffering?
> 
> ... No? Well I'm giving it to you anyways.
> 
> (Also there's an actual happy ending to this one and Cuttlefish isn't dead. You know, just a side-note.)
> 
> Please leave a comment detailing why I need to be stopped! :)


	28. Chapter 28

 "Pearlie?"

 "Yeah?"

 "Come over here real quick. I need to show you something."

 Pearl made her way to the couch where Marina was sitting, staring at her laptop. And she had such a cute expression, Pearl couldn't  _ help _ but give her forehead a little kiss.

 "What up?" the diminutive inkling asked.

 "Well first of all, what were you doing?" Marina asked.

 "Rearranging our stuff," Pearl said.

 "Again?"

 Pearl smiled guiltily. "I just… there's not a lot of room…"

 Marina rolled her eyes. "You're not always going to have the lap of luxury, Pearlie."

 "Yeah… just… I miss the house. This place'll keep us safe, but it's… it's not home, y'know?"

 Marina nodded. "Yeah. I feel the same."

 Pearl was silent for a moment as she fidgeted in place. "... My dad keeps calling me."

 "He does?" Marina asked, folding her laptop and stowing it. "Have you talked to him?"

 "No," Pearl said. "I… don't know what he'll say."

 "That's why you pick up the phone, Pearl. To find out what he wants to say," Marina joked. Pearl didn't smile.

 "I don't think I could handle it if he turned out to be just as racist as those cops," Pearl said. "I don't wanna have that argument with him, y'know? I would definitely take your side, but… I don't wanna  _ have to _ take sides against the fam."

 Marina hugged her. "I understand. I wouldn't want that for you either. But he's probably just worried about you."

 "I know, I know…" Pearl said. "Can we talk about this again some other time? Not really feelin' it right now."

 "Alright," Marina said. Then her eyes lit up as she remembered something. "Right! Pearlie! Do you remember how we were helping Eight in the metro through her CQ-80 that I hacked?"

 "Yeah, of course," Pearl said. "Why?"

 "Well…" Marina said, taking her laptop back out and opening it. She navigated through files for a moment, and then turned the screen to Pearl.

 It was a picture of Eight in Kamabo.

 "Is this a picture from back then?" Pearl asked.

 Marina shook her head. "This was taken about an hour and a half ago."

 This information took a moment to register, and then Pearl almost fell off the couch. "Are you telling me she's  _ in _ Kamabo?! The place that splatted her over and over again and then almost killed her?!"

 "Yes. And I don't know why she would go back there, but at least we know where she is!" Marina cheered.

 "She looks real beat up," Pearl said. "I don't like seeing her like that…"

 "I don't either," Marina agreed.

 "Don't like seeing who like what?" Marie asked, entering the room with Four by her side. They were holding hands as they walked in.

 "Eight," Marina said. "We found her. And… she seems hurt."

 Marie walked behind the couch to look at the picture on Marina's screen, and Four peered from behind her.

 "Is that… the underground Metro?" Marie asked.

 "Under _ sea _ , but yeah. Seems like it," Pearl said.

 "But that place was killing her!" Four spoke up. "We talked about it. That sanitized ink burns your skin, and she got hit with it a  _ lot _ down there."

 "Yeah. I'm really concerned that she's gotten herself into a dangerous situation again," Marina said.

 "Then can we go get her out of it?" Four asked, bringing the room to silence. "If she looks that bad, Three's probably in the same state. We should just go get them."

 "Well… they're staying away for a reason, Four," Marie said.

 "I mean, it's not like we can get in any  _ more _ trouble now that you've rescued two 'fugitives'," Four said, making clear air quotes. "Come on, they've been hiding enough. Let's go!"

 "Yo, aren't you still injured?" Pearl asked.

 "I'm still good to fight," Four said, pumping her fist against her chest with only a little wince. She turned to Marie. "Please. I want to go."

 Marie sighed, but relented. "Okay. Let's go then." She looked at Off the Hook on the couch. "Would you two please keep an eye on Octo Canyon? It would really suck if we got some unwanted guests while we were gone."

 "You can count on us," Marina said.

 "Yo! You two should take our chopper!" Pearl said. "It wasn't at the mansion. It's at one of my other houses."

 "... Okay, how rich  _ are _ you?" Four asked. "I was a fan of you two for a long time, and even  _ I  _ can't really figure out how big of a number is in your bank account."

 "Accounts," Pearl corrected. "Here, I'll write the address down for you." She searched for a piece of paper and scrawled some messy handwriting onto it.

 "Umm, I don't know how to pilot a helicopter. Do you?" Four asked Marie.

 "I've worked… similar stuff before," Marie said. "It'll be fine."

 "That… you know what, I'mma leave that one alone," Pearl said.

 "And please be careful," Marina said as the shorter inkling handed the address over. "There might be police there searching for us. Probably not enough to warrant a huge amount of resistance, but still be cautious."

 "Don't worry. There's no way I'm letting Four get any more hurt," Marie said.

 Pearl rolled her eyes. "Alright lovebirds, get a room before you start making out."

 Four and Marie's faces both lit up in their respective ink colors.

 Marina lightly slapped her girlfriend's arm. "Pearlie! That wasn't nice!"

 Again, Pearl rolled her eyes. "You two should go. The longer Eight's in that hellhole, the more she's probably suffering."

 Marie and Four recovered from their flustered states and nodded. They turned to leave.

 "Hey Four," Marina said.

 "Hm?" the yellow inkling questioned, turning her head back.

 "It's always good to meet a fan. Please make sure to come back safely so we can get to know you better," Marina said with one of her trademark smiles.

 Four nodded determinedly and then left with Marie.

 

* * *

 

 "Your flying really wasn't bad at all!" Four shouted to Marie as she walked around the helicopter after taking her stand on the other side. The house hadn't been dangerous, but the entrance to Kamabo definitely was. There had been police scattered about the surface, but getting rid of them hadn't been too terribly difficult. And to be fair, the cops fired first.

 "I managed to land it at least. That's an improveme- uh, expected! Yeah, I have never had issues before!" Marie said.

 "Alrighty then," Four said, causing Marie to breathe a sigh of relief for her lack of questioning. "We should head in. Who knows what Eight and Three are dealing with right now?"

 Marie nodded, and they turned to the entrance into the underwater lair. In fact, they turned just in time to see a hand reach up to the top of the ladder.

 The two newcomers watched in awe as Eight pulled herself out of the hole and stepped out into the morning sun, panting from exertion. The octoling then reached down and helped Three up the rest of the ladder.

 "Three!" Marie shouted, running towards the agent. The Squid Sister clearly startled her, but the green-tentacled inkling didn't even have enough time to put a hand on her gun before she was wrapped into a tight hug.

 "Marie?! What are you doing here?!" Three asked, disbelief clear in her voice.

 Instead of answering, Marie pulled out of the hug and pointed a scolding finger at her fellow agent. "Next time you plan on going rogue,  _ tell _ me first. You got that?"

 Three rolled her eyes. "Glad to see you too."

 Marie took a second to examine the inkling before her. Compared to how Four had been, she looked not too injured. However, the way she was squinting her right eye did not inspire confidence. Then Marie looked at the octoling in the group, and it was very evident that she had it the worst out of all of them. Marie was surprised she was still standing, much less being capable of climbing up such a tall ladder. And… she was staring wide-eyed at Marie. Was she breathing?

 Three gently rubbed Eight's upper back. "Breathe. She's a friend."

 The octoling seemed to force herself to take a breath. "Y-y-you're Marie… f-from the Squid Sisters…"

 Three chuckled. "She's a little starstruck."

 "Y-you and Callie changed my life… thank you," Eight said. She attempted to bow deeply, but winced in pain and almost fell over.

 "Easy now, I don't want you getting any more hurt," Marie said, supporting Eight and smiling. "But I'm glad we were able to make such a positive impact."

 When Marie looked back to Three, the agent wasn't where she had previously been standing. She was instead reaching down the ladder to help someone else up.

 "Gramps?!" Marie said, shocked. She hadn't known where he was, but that wasn't unusual for him. She never even imagined that he would have ended up in a place like this.

 "That's it. I'm going to sue this place for a sheer lack of accessibility options," Cuttlefish said. He was the least injured-looking of the bunch, thankfully, but he had clearly been through a lot regardless. Plus he was wheezing from the exertion of climbing the ladder and sounded like he was dying.

 "Okay, I'm going to need an explanation for what happened down there, but that can wait. You all look exhausted," Marie said.

 "I'm f-fine," Eight said, struggling through the words.

 "I don't suppose you brought anything that would help with pain?" Three asked, holding a hand over her eye.

 "There's a medkit in the helicopter!" Four called.

 Three, now suddenly realizing the other inkling's presence, jolted her head towards her. "Four? When… Oh my god, you look like shit. Did those sanitized inklings do that to you?"

 Four shrugged. "Yeah, they got me pretty good. Not your fault, though. I practically forced you to leave."

 Three still looked at her guiltily. "If you say so…"

 "Come on, let's all go home," Marie said. "It seems like we could all use some time to recover."

 "Not yet. We have an errand to do first," Cuttlefish said, unstrapping the frozen Tartar from his back. Parts of it had thawed slightly and were jiggling just a little bit.

 "What is  _ that _ ?" Four asked.

 " _ This _ is the actual culprit for what happened to Inkopolis," Cuttlefish said. "I'm going to bring it to my commanding officer."

 "The Major?" Three said with disgust. "I hate that guy."

 "He can be… difficult, but he's not all bad. And he has the connections needed to solve our problems," Cuttlefish said. "He's our best option."

 "Okay, and  _ then _ you people will rest," Marie said. "Everybody in the helicopter."

 Three blanched. "No! Marie, I meant it when I said I'd never ride in a helicopter you're piloting again."

 "Wait, really? What happened with her piloting before?" Four asked.

 Three scratched a sore spot on her arm from when the chain had been constricting her. "Well, she-"

 "Let's not tell this story," Marie blurted out, face blushing profusely in embarrassment.

 Three peered over the edge of the barge. "Hey, the speedboat's still here. Let's take it and get back to Inkopolis."

 "Okay, fine," Marie huffed. "As long as we head out quickly. The next wave of police could show up any moment now."

 The five got into the speedboat, unchained it from the base, and set off. On the trip, Four dug painkillers for Eight and Three out of the medkit that she took from the helicopter, because they both clearly needed it. Eight was hesitant, but took the medicine without too much coaxing.

 They docked the boat approximately where it had been when the two rogue cephalopods had 'borrowed' it, and they started the trek to the building that Cap'n Cuttlefish needed to head to. It was the middle of the morning, but the group was able to surround Eight to keep her discreet from any prying eyes. After all, she was public enemy number one, and the rest of them, even Marie, weren't nearly as high-profile at the moment.

 Staring up at the normal-looking office building that they finally arrived at, Eight looked pensive.

 "I-is this really going to be it? If your commanding officer gets the phone, will this all be over?"

 Cuttlefish looked back at her with a pitying expression. "I can't be entirely sure.  _ If _ he's receptive to the evidence, it should help clear you by a legal standpoint. The police shouldn't chase you anymore. But…" he sighed, "I can't imagine the people's minds changing so quickly."

 Marie put a hand on Eight's shoulder. "Hey, we'll make sure nothing bad happens to you, though."

 Three, under her breath, grumbled, "If anyone touches you, they're gonna lose a hand."

 Cuttlefish saluted to the group and hobbled up to the building's door. "I'd best be off."

 "Wait!" Three blurted out. "What if that  _ thing _ wakes up again?!"

 "I'm counting on it," Cuttlefish said. "I need it awake to interrogate it."

 "But… uh, doesn't that thing slither around and take over minds?" Four asked.

 "The NSS is pretty well-equipped. I'll be able to find a containment device," Cuttlefish said. "Don't worry about me. All of you should worry about sleeping. You look exhausted, especially you, Agent Eight." He opened the door. "I'm not going to be leaving this place until the Major either listens to what I have to say or throws me out himself. Believe me when I say that." Then he closed the door behind him.

 Three turned to Eight and smiled. Honest-to-god smiled. Marie, in the two years she had worked with Three, had never seen her smile like this.

 "So, ready to be a free octoling?" the agent asked.

 "I… I really don't know," Eight said. "This is a bit overwhelming."

 "I mean, maybe you should sleep on it. The whole world isn't going to disappear if you get a little shut-eye," Four commented.

 "Yeah… that would be nice…" Eight yawned and leaned her weight onto Three, who blushed and looked away, but didn't resist.

 And then an echoing voice boomed from the skies.

 "Ooo, what's this?" Callie's amplified voice rang out. "This looks dangerous. It should be great for destroying Inkopolis!"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter had a little bit of everyone. Eight, Three, Four, Marie, Off the Hook, Cuttlefish, and Demon Callie!
> 
> Yaaaay Demon Callie!
> 
> Comment.


	29. Chapter 29

 "Was that… Callie…?" Three asked.

 "Yes," Marie said. "Yeah, it was."

 "Great! I want to say hi to her, too," Three said.

 "Uhh… maybe don't do that," Four said.

 "What? Why?" Three asked.

 "Callie isn't… herself," Marie said. "Long story short, she's brainwashed. Again."

 Eight covered her mouth. "Oh no… Four said this had already happened before…"

 "It did," Marie said. "I don't think it ever really stopped, actually."

 "Well where's the voice coming from? We need to get her back and stop her from destroying the city!" Three said, ready to break into a run.

 "Stop. No," Marie said firmly. "You are not going on any more adventures today. You are going to go to Cuttlefish Cabin and sleep. Is that understood?"

 "But-"

 "And Eight, too," Marie said. "And Four-"

 "-is going to help you search," the shortest of the group said. "Because Four is a big girl and has already had some recovery time for her boo-boos."

 "... Alright, fine. You can come with me," Marie said. Then she turned to the two other agents. "But I'm not being lenient about you two. Go. Rest." She pointed in the direction of the grate to Octo Canyon.

 "... You'd better find Callie," Three grumbled, taking Eight's hand and leading her towards the ink grate. They turned a corner and left Four and Marie's sights.

 "I haven't known them for very long, but there's no way that they're going to let themselves rest, is there?" Four asked.

 "I can't speak for Eight, but you are absolutely right when it comes to Three," Marie said, sighing. "We should go before we miss our chance to nab Callie."

 "Yeah, where was her voice coming from?" Four asked.

 "I think it was from the direction we just came from. Kamabo." Marie pointed to the gigantic statue that was just barely visible past the large buildings.

 "... That's not a good sign, is it?" Four asked.

 Marie cupped Four's cheek just briefly, because the Squid Sister needed the support in that moment. "No. No it isn't."

 The two inklings shared a look, nodded, and then they both super jumped in the direction of the world-ending statue.

 

* * *

 

 "Eight!!!" Marina shouted before running up and squeezing the other octoling into a hug.

 Eight hadn't been expecting to see Off the Hook here of all places, but she was glad to see Marina. The hug, however, was really tight and was hurting Eight a lot, but Marina seemed happy so she didn't want to get in the way of that.

 "Hey, let go, you're hurting her," Three said. More scolded, really. But regardless, she spoke up to rescue Eight.

 Marina immediately released her embrace, taking a moment to look the shorter octoling over and assess just how reckless that hug had been. "Eight, I'm so sorry! I didn't mean to hurt you, I…"

 "It's fine Marina. Really. I'm so glad to see you, too," Eight said with a genuine smile.

 "You gave us a big scare when we found out you were in Kamabo again," Pearl said, emerging from the house with a tray of cookies. "Try not to do that to us again, m'kay?"

 There wasn't an answer, other than the rumbling of both Three and Eight's stomachs as they witnessed the tray of sugary delights. Well actually, Eight didn't know what they were, but they smelled heavenly. How long had she been in that metro this time? How long had it been since Three or she had eaten?

 "Well don't just stare. I made these to welcome you two back!" Pearl said. "Let's all come inside and catch up, 'kay? Maybe _patch_ _up_ too, considering how… uh, ragged you both look."

 

* * *

 

 "... Shit…" Three said contemplatively as she held a hand over her terribly aching eye. "Never thought they would turn on you two like that. Off the Hook was big. You had a huge fan base, and they turned on you just like that?"

 "Yeah they did, the fuckin' bastards…" Pearl swore.

 "Pearl," Marina lightly scolded, "they aren't 'bastards', they're just… confused."

 "God, are all of you octolings this forgiving? Eight does the same thing. Just for once, please, acknowledge that inkling society is full of assholes right now. Both of you deserve that much," Three said. " _Especially_ you, Eight. They actually locked you up. You've got the right to be at least a little angry."

 The group looked at the octoling in question, only to see her staring inquisitively at the cookie on the coffee table.

 "Uhh, you gonna eat that?" Pearl asked.

 "Oh, am I supposed to?" Eight returned. She cautiously picked the pastry up and then took a slow and experimental bite of it. Her eyes immediately widened, and then tears started coming out of them.

 "Eight, are you… crying?" Three questioned.

 The tears just kept coming as Eight seemed to savor every single crumb of the bite, moaning from the taste. As she finally swallowed it, she closed her eyes and started sniffling.

 "I'm sorry, I'm so sorry… it's just… this is the best thing I've ever tasted… What is this…? I… I can't stop crying, it's so nice…" the tears were pouring out of Eight's eyes at this point.

 "Woah, okay, it's not _that_ great. You have to have had _something_ better than this at some point. I think Pearl is an average baker at best," Three said. She peeked back towards the shorter inkling expecting an indignant reaction, but was surprised to see both members of Off the Hook looking quite somber. "Uh, sorry. I didn't mean to insult your cooking that bad."

 "No, it's not… it's not that," Pearl said. "It's… uh…"

 Marina spoke in her girlfriend's place. "We found something out about your past, Eight. Or, Marie did. And-"

 "You did? That's great!" Three said, Eight wiping her eyes and nodding enthusiastically along with her. "Let's hear it!"

 Marina and Pearl gave each other worried glances before Marina spoke up again. "Um…"

 

* * *

 

 Ten minutes later, Pearl and Marina were desperately holding Three back from charging out of the door.

 "LET ME GO! I HAVE TO KILL HIM!" Three roared out, managing to drag the two idols a foot closer to the door with her nearly unrivaled strength.

 "No, Agent Three, murdering Octavio isn't going to solve anything!" Marina pleaded. It took both her and Pearl's entire body weights to hamper the agent this much, and it was only barely holding her back.

 Meanwhile, Eight was sitting frozen in place, her entire world having been shattered. She had… intentionally been given a terrible life? So she could be a sacrifice to the octarian army's plans? She… she thought that it was just a normal part of life to be treated like dirt. Well… she supposed she _was_ dirt, but she had known that already. But now not only did she know she was insignificant, but she also felt so… broken because of it. Why was this affecting her so much? Why did this… hurt?! The world was spinning and spinning and it was collapsing around her and she was losing grip, losing grip with everything-

 "Eight! Eight, hey, stay with me!"

 She knew the voice. Three. There were other voices, but Three's was the only one that pierced through the fog. Eight felt a pair of arms wrap themselves around her, keeping her together.

 "Eight, breathe with me. Remember how to breathe," Three's voice said.

 Once again, Eight went through the motions of calming herself down. In, and out. In, and out. She found the strength to escape her own head, and came back to the world with a trio of very concerned-looking cephalopods gazing upon her. Three was holding her tight, once again an anchor to keep her from losing herself.

 "Eight? Keep breathing. Just in and out, okay?" Three said, now much clearer.

 "I'm okay now. I'm back," Eight said. Why was she on the floor now? "I'm sorry that I keep making you save me from that. I don't like being a burden."

 Three sighed and squeezed her just a little bit. She was clearly avoiding any injured areas, which was greatly appreciated. "You're not being a burden, Eight. And that was a pretty normal reaction for realizing that your whole life has been a lie."

 "Eight, I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to do that to you," Marina said, looking incredibly guilty.

 "N-no. Thank you for telling me. I'm… I'm glad I at least know about my past now," Eight said.

 "Are you… gonna be okay?" Pearl asked.

 Eight didn't know. She didn't know if she was or would ever be okay after this. But she shouldn't complain. She should never complain. "Yes. Yeah, I'll be fine. Please don't worry about me."

 Three looked completely unconvinced. She shifted her arms around Eight, then suddenly stood up and lifted the octoling into her arms.

 "I'm taking you to bed. You definitely need it," the green-tentacled inkling said.

 Eight felt a compulsion to protest, but the firm yet considerate grasp of the inkling's arms made her think twice about it.

 "Okay, but you should rest too," Pearl said. "You both look half-dead. And Marie already texted us to make sure you sleep a little."

 Three rolled her eyes. "That _does_ sound like her…"

 The inkling carried Eight all the way to a bedroom and then gently deposited her onto the bed.

 "Thank you," Eight said meekly.

 "You don't have to thank me," Three said.

 "I'm sorry."

 "You don't have to be sorry, either."

 Eight didn't know what she was _supposed_ to do at this point, so she just stayed quiet. She was already missing having Three's arms around her.

 "Alright, rest up. Good night-ish, Eight," Three said.

 She turned to leave, but Eight caught the back of her shirt.

 "Hm? Something wrong?" Three asked, turning her head to face Eight again.

 Eight mentally chastised herself. She was being selfish. It wasn't Three's responsibility to cater to her whims. How could she be such a child about this?

 "Eight, I can _see_ you being unfair to yourself. Spit it out," Three said.

 "I….. don't want to be alone," Eight admitted, and immediately felt guilty about. It was stupid. Stupid, stupid, just a waste of Three's time.

 Three allowed herself the tiniest smile. "Okay. I'll stay in the room with you until you fall asleep."

 Eight, don't say it. Don't do it. It'll be too far. Don't, Eight.

 "Can… can you lay in the bed with me?" Eight said despite herself.

 Three's face flushed green, but she didn't refuse. She awkwardly shuffled closer to the bed and periodically glanced at Eight's face as if to check if she was joking. Then she slowly climbed under the sheets about a foot away from the octoling.

 "Okay, I'm here," Three said.

 "Thank you…" Eight said. She scooted a little closer to the inkling, which made her face blush a little more.

 Three seemingly took a moment to compose herself. Then she spoke in a low, rough voice that betrayed how worn-out she was.

 "Hey, can we… can we talk about what happened in Kamabo?"

 "You don't need to worry. I don't blame you for attacking me," Eight said. "That was all the phone."

 "That's not… I mean, thanks, but that isn't what I was talking about," Three said. "I meant what happened right before that, when Tartar had just taken control of me. You know, when I… kissed… you?"

 Eight tilted her head at Three. "Kissed? I don't know what that means."

 Three frowned. "Well yeah. Of course. Of course you wouldn't know about that. You were kept in the dark about so much in the Octarian army," she said. Then she took a deep breath. "Kissing is… well, it's how a lot of people show that they… uh… it's how they show they... love each other."

 "Love…" Eight said, contemplative. "I've heard that word, I think, but I don't really know what it means either. What does love mean?"

 Three was silent for a moment.

 "I think we should get some sleep," she said finally. She rolled over so that her back was showing to Eight.

 "Alright," the octoling said. She wrapped her arms around Three, who went stiff with the contact. Just as Eight was about to jerk her arms away from her companion again, Three grabbed one of the octoling's hands and held it still across her torso.

 "Thanks," Three said.

 "No, thank you. I feel a lot safer when I'm close to you," Eight said, making herself comfortable in the hugging position.

 Three paused, seemingly in reaction to what her bedmate said. "... G'night, Eight."

 "Good night, Three."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, Eight knows about her own past now, for better or for worse. The gang has split up once again, half going to find Callie and half taking a much-needed cuddle nap.
> 
> Because splitting the party is _always_ a good idea.
> 
> I hope you enjoyed, and I hope you'll comment and tell me about your thoughts! Have a nice day!


	30. Chapter 30

 "Can I be honest with you, Marie?" Four asked.

 "You know you can, sweetie," Marie said.

 Only briefly being taken off-guard by the new nickname, Four spoke again. "This place… Kamabo… it scares me. With the terrible things it's done to Eight… and to the  _ city _ … I don't think I ever want to go down there."

 Marie nodded. "I feel the same. This place… nothing good has come from it. Only pain." Then Marie gave her girlfriend a small smile. "But I don't think we're going to have to go down there, thankfully. The voice was definitely coming from the speakers in this statue."

 Four stood up from their place sitting on the shoulder of the behemoth. "That's a relief. But… uh… I don't think Callie's still here. Unless you see something I don't…?"

 "No, I think you're right. She mustn't have been here for too long," Marie said.

 The faint sound of helicopters in the distance grabbed both of the inklings' attention.

 "The police," Marie said. "It figures they would come back after we splatted them."

 "Where the heck do they keep getting helicopters?" Four said.

 Marie stood up. "Come on. I'd prefer to get out of their way for now. We can keep looking tomorrow." She outstretched her hand to Four. The shorter inkling took it, smiled, and then they started their climb down the statue.

 

* * *

 

 In the morning, Eight couldn't move at all. That wasn't an exaggeration. Any move she tried to make with her muscles left her locked up and aching. She was completely immobile.

 She turned her head slowly to see Three pushing herself off the bed. Her movements were creaky and strained as well, but at least she was moving. She started ruffling through a dresser as Eight watched from behind.

 "Good morning, Three," the octoling said.

 "Oh! Uh, you're awake! Hi!" Three said. "I, uh, was about to change my clothes so… could you please look away?"

 Eight tilted her head in confusion. "Why?"

 Three fumbled a bit. "It's, uh… it's because… Look, in inkling society we don't watch each other changing. That's just how it is."

 "Oh? What happens if you do?" Eight asked.

 "Well… nothing. But… we just… we just don't do it, okay? Trust me," Three said, her face growing increasingly more green.

 "I do trust you," Eight said. "I'll look away."

 "Thank you," Three said.

 The octoling tried to turn her whole body, but only managed to turn her head. It was enough, though.

 "Okay, you can look now," Three said.

 Eight looked back towards the inkling and… wow, she'd never actually seen Three in anything but her Hero outfit. She looked really nice in the shirt and shorts she had changed into.  _ Really  _ nice.

 "Um…" Three said, seeming to subconsciously cover herself up with her arms. It was then that Eight realized she had been staring. She didn't really know why she had been doing it, she was just… entranced.

 "Sorry. You look really cute!" Eight said.

 Three turned around so that Eight couldn't see her face. "... Th-thanks." She took a moment, then turned back towards the octoling on the bed. "... I've got some selections of clothes here that you can pick from, if you want. I might even have a crop-top since you seem to, uh… like them so much."

 Eight knew it would be rude to decline that offer, so she tried to move again. She strained and strained, but she felt so weak, and she only managed to get herself up to a seated position. It just  _ hurt _ to do anything more.

 "Woah, woah, take it easy. Don't strain yourself," Three said. "You can relax. You've been through a lot."

 "So have you, and yet you're still moving," Eight protested. "I don't want to be useless."

 "Eight, this self-deprecating shit needs to stop," Three said. "You are worth way more than how the octarians treated you. Please remember that."

 Eight silently nodded. She didn't want to argue with Three's logic. Honestly, she would  _ like _ to feel like a full person. But she knew she wasn't quite there yet.

 There was a knock on the bedroom door.

 "Uh, come in?" Three said.

 Marina pushed open the door with a tray of breakfast foods. Or at least that was Eight's best guess. There were brown, wiggly... strips and flat white disk things with browned edges and yellow orbs in the middle of them. And there was also toast. Eight knew toast. The octarians had an entire robot based around toast.

 "Good morning, you two~," Marina said in a singsong voice. "Hungry for breakfast?"

 Both agents in the room nodded. After all, they  _ still _ hadn't had a proper meal yet.

 Marina smiled and distributed the plates. And not long after, Eight cried over how delicious food is for the second time in twenty-four hours.

 

* * *

 

 "Come on, just one song?" Marie pleaded as they made their way back up to the statue.

 "Marie, please stop asking," Four said. "I haven't sung in front of anyone since I was a kid. I'm just not ready."

 "You could sing Calamari Inkantation! I already heard you sing that one, so it should be okay, right?" Marie continued.

 "Marie…"

 "I'm sorry, I'm sorry," Marie said. "It's just that I know you have a great singing voice now and I'm really eager to hear it more!"

 Four rubbed her own arm. "You're exaggerating. My singing isn't very good."

 "Get some self-confidence, girl! You're a natural!" Marie said.

 "So why are all the police gone now?" Four said, quickly changing the subject.

 Marie gave her a dirty look for the topic diversion, but relented. "I don't know if you've noticed, but we don't have the most… competent police force."

 "Yeahhhh…" Four said.

 "They probably charged off to who-knows-where trying to follow us instead of waiting to see if we show up here again," Mary said. Then she smirked. "Amateurs."

 "To be honest, that… definitely sounds like something  _ I _ would do," Four admitted.

 "Well that's why we make a good team, isn't it?" Marie said, latching onto her girlfriend and kissing her cheek. Four became a flustered mess from the action.

 "Come on, Marie! We're climbing up a statue! Y-you're gonna make me fall!"

 Marie, once again, smirked. "Sorry, sweetie~!" Then she inked a path and raced up the statue in squid form. Four, not wanting to fall behind, chased after her.

 Marie emerged at the top, but was sheerly unprepared for how fast Four was.

 "Tackle hug!" Four shouted as she popped out of her ink and proceeded to pin the Squid Sister to the ground.

 "Alright, alright Four, you got me!" Marie said.

 "Yup! I sure did!" Four beamed. "I've got you right where I want you!"

 "My, aren't  _ you _ playful today?" Marie said. She couldn't help it. Four was just being  _ so _ cute.

 "I guess I am," Four said, then pecked Marie's lips.

 Marie, not satisfied with that, leaned her head up for a second, longer kiss that Four obliged. It really just felt like the two of them for a bit. Like the world disappeared.

 Unfortunately, the world was still there, and so were its problems. Marie ended the kiss, then motioned for Four to get off. The shorter inkling did so.

 "Alright, let's see what we can find," Marie said. "Or even better, let's make a call to someone who can probably find even more than we could."

 She pulled out her cell phone and dialed a number.

 

* * *

 

 Eight, after eating something, gained enough strength to get out of bed. It still hurt, but she could handle this amount of pain. Three helped her find a pink crop-top and some shorts, and then they headed out of the bedroom.

 She, Three, Pearl and Marina spent time in the living room discussing the time that Eight and Three had spent being rogue. The two members of Off the Hook continually gave concerned glances whenever Eight detailed ways that she had gotten injured, but the octoling assured them that she was alright.

 The conversation had already started winding down when Marina's phone started ringing.

 "Hello?" she said after answering it. "Oh! Would you mind if I put you on speaker? Alright."

 The tall octoling pressed a button on her phone and laid it on the coffee table. "You're on speaker now, Marie."

 " _ Hi, _ " Marie's voice came from the phone. " _ Are Eight and Three there? _ "

 "Yeah, hi," Three said.

 "Hello," Eight said.

 " _ How are you two? _ "

 "Um… sore," Three said.

 " _ Well, it's better than dead, I guess, _ " Marie said.

 "How 'bout you? How's the rescue mission going?" Pearl asked.

 " _ That depends on how well this phone call goes, _ " Marie said. " _ Marina, Agent Six, I could use your technical expertise right now. _ "

 "Uh, right!" Marina said, pulling out her laptop. "Fire away."

 " _ We've looked through this thing for quite a bit and we've come up empty. You told me that you have gotten the specs on this statue thing before. Can you still access those? _ "

 "Yes, I think so," Marina said. She typed frantically on her keyboard. "Here it is. What do you need to know?"

 " _ Are there any, like, super-secret hiding spots? _ " Four shouted through the phone from a distance.

 " _ What she means to say is, 'Are there any places that would be easy to miss?' _ " Marie clarified.

 "Hmm… not much that I can see. The only open spaces inside of the statue are the cockpit and the compartment that the cannon comes out of," Marina said, studying the schematics.

 " _ Wait, cannon? What cannon? Where cannon? _ " Four's voice came through the phone.

 "You know, the cannon!" Pearl said. "The gigantic one sticking out of the mouth of the thing that destroyed like a fifth of Inkopolis. That cannon."

 " _ Hmm… it isn't sticking out of the mouth anymore, _ " Marie said.

 "It's because Tartar had already gotten ready to fire it again," Eight said rather solemnly.

 "Whoa, really? No joke?" Pearl asked.

 Eight nodded.

 "Shit, that phone wasn't kidding around. If it'd gotten the two of us, it definitely would have finished off the city," Three said.

 " _ Then it's good that you stopped that maniac when you did, _ " Marie said. " _ Agent Six, is there a way to get into the mouth cavity? _ "

 No one responded.

 Marie audibly sighed. " _ Marina. _ "

 "Oh right! I'm Agent Six!" Marina exclaimed, then she scrolled around on her computer. "It looks like you should be able to get in through one of the floor tiles in the cockpit."

 " _ Alright. Four, let's get moving! _ " Marie said, and then there was the sound of shuffling on the other end of the phone.

 " _ Alright, we're here! _ " Four shouted through the phone. " _ Blegh, all of this green goop in these blender things. What even is this stuff? _ "

 No one at Cuttlefish Cabin responded. After all, they all knew the true answer, and it wasn't pleasant.

 " _ Alright, thank you Agent Six, _ " Marie said formally. " _ We'll continue our search in here. _ "

 "Wait!" Eight interjected and immediately wanted to take it back. She shouldn't speak out of turn like that.

 " _ Is this Eight? I don't really know your voice yet, dude, _ " Marie said.

 "Y-yes, that's me," Eight said.

 " _ Was there something you wanted to say? _ " Marie asked.

 Eight hesitated, but eventually spoke. She was being asked a direct question now, and she supposed it would be rude to take it back at this point.

 "I… while you are searching, would you please check if there are any gaps in the number of," a chill ran down Eight's spine, "... blenders?"

 " _ Sure, but why do you ask? _ " Marie questioned.

 "I… uh… I have a bad feeling," Eight said meekly.

 "I'd say that's worth looking into if it's worrying you that much," Three said, giving Eight a thumbs-up.

 " _ We'll keep an eye out for it, Eight! _ " Four declared.

 " _ Again, thank you all for your help. I hope the next time we see you, we'll have Callie with us,"  _ Marie said before hanging up.

 

* * *

 

 Eight wasn't being paranoid. Several of the blenders were gone.

 "How… how does that even make sense?" Four asked. "These things are massive! How the heck did Callie take them so quickly? How would she even  _ lift  _ them?"

 Marie looked worriedly off into the distance. "I… I think those malfunctioning shades might be doing more to her than we originally thought," she said.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Did I upload this at 1:34 a.m.? Yes. Will I every be truly consistent with my upload schedule? Hell no.
> 
> Also, another chapter with zero torture! Yay!
> 
> Cherish these.
> 
> Don't not comment or I won't be not sad.  
> (Aka, comment because I like responding to them. OK bye.)


	31. Chapter 31

 Three froze when Eight found her in the bedroom packing a bag.

 "Uh…" the startled inkling got out.

 "Are you… leaving?" Eight asked.

 Three hesitated, then sighed. "... Yes."

 "But Marie said that we should stay here and rest," Eight said.

 "I know," Three returned.

 "Are you planning to track down Callie?"

 "Yeah."

 "Do you know where she is?"

 "Not a clue. But I'm gonna find her anyways," Three said, then resumed her packing.

 Eight was silent for a moment.

 "Then I will join you," Eight finally said.

 "What? No! No way!" Three objected. "You are not in any condition to keep fighting. You've done enough."

 "In all fairness, you don't seem to be quite in fighting condition either," Eight said. "I don't want to overstep, but I think going off on your own is a bad idea."

 "I hate feeling useless, okay? I need to do something to help with this Callie situation," Three said. "I can't just sit here when my friend is in danger. It just makes me feel worthless."

 "You are not. Please don't say that about yourself," Eight said. "If you really want to go search for her, though, then please take me with you."

 "Eight, I'm not going to do that. You should just rest here. Recover from your injuries," Three said.

 "Please. I want to go with you," Eight pleaded.

 "Eight, if you get hurt again, I'm not going to forgive myself," Three said. "You've already been through more than any cephalopod should have to go through. I don't want you suffering any more."

 "Well I don't like thinking about you suffering either!" Eight exclaimed, which shut Three up. "When you were trapped in Kamabo, I was so terrified and worried about you. I don't want to feel like that again. Please don't make me feel like that again." Eight felt tears prickling at the sides of her eyes.

 "Hey hey hey, ssshhh, it's fine. I'm okay. You got me out of there," Three said frantically as she saw Eight starting to cry. The octoling sniffled a bit, then wiped the tears away and tried to keep them from coming back. Once Three saw this, she continued. "Eight…I need you to know that that's how I feel every time you put yourself in danger like this. You keep doing it, too. You stop giving a shit about your own safety just because you think mine is more important, but it's not! God, the world would probably be better off without me, but you? You bring the people close to you together in a way that no one else can. I know you weren't treated like it back home, but you really are a gift." Three punctuated this by turning her blushing face away.

 Eight, however, looked quite solemn. "The world wouldn't be better without you. Please don't say that."

 Three sighed, then put on a small smile. "Alright, I won't, as long as you won't either. You're allowed to have some self-confidence now. And I will beat the shit out of anyone who says otherwise."

 Eight nodded. Self-confidence. What a weird concept. She supposed she could try, for Three.

 "... Please let me come with you. I don't want you to go alone, and I also really care that Callie makes it back home. I want her to know that she and Marie probably saved my life."

 Three sighed again and shook her head with a smile on her face. "You are persistent. Alright. We'll watch each other's backs."

 Eight beamed and then lurched into a tight hug with the inkling. It hurt Eight to do so, but the as-of-yet-still-mysterious feelings that she got from being so close to someone she trusted so much made it completely worth it.

 

 

* * *

 

 

 Fully packed, the two cephalopods tried to sneak their way out.

 "Going somewhere, punks?"

 It appeared that stealth was neither of their strong suits at the moment, however.

 "... Hi, Pearl," Three said.

 "'Sup," Pearl said from the living room chair.

 "I'm also here," Marina said, peeking out from the kitchen.

 "Aaaaand there's Marina…" Three said.

 "Marie told us specifically not to let you two leave. You're injured, and you need to recover. You both know this, and yet you're still trying to sneak out?" Marina asked.

 "I can heal after I've got my friend back," Three said.

 "You're gonna hurt yourself," Pearl warned.

 "Then I'll heal from that, too," Three said.

 Marina sighed. "I suppose I expected this from you after hearing Marie's description of your personality," then she looked at the octoling standing behind the green-tentacled agent, "but you, Eight? I wouldn't have guessed you'd try to do something like this. Is Three dragging you into this?"

 Eight shook her head. "No. She actually tried to stop me from coming, but this is important to me."

 Pearl facepalmed. "Ugh, both of you are beat the hell up and shouldn't be doing shit like this! What don't you get about that?"

 "Maybe Eight's beat up, but I'm fine," Three said.

 "Bullshit. We've all seen how you've been squinting your eye," Pearl said. "It's hurting you, isn't it? Hurting you a lot."

 Three covered her injured eye with a hand. "Mind your own business, pipsqueak."

 "Pipsqueak?!" Pearl exclaimed, looking just about ready to throw hands.

 "Marina, Pearl… when I was down in the Undersea Metro the first time, doing tests and… suffering, I was all alone," Eight said, drawing everyone's attention back to the matter at hand. "I know I had you two and Craig and I really appreciate that you three were there for me, but there was no one who was going to be able to take over for me or help me through those awful tests." Eight took a deep breath as those unpleasant memories threatened to take over. She was able to push them down, though. "I… I have to imagine that's how Callie feels right now, but even worse. I want to free her from that, and I don't want Marie and Four to be alone in the fight either. Please… let us go help them. I can't stand thinking about Callie being alone and scared any longer."

 Marina and Pearl shared a look.

 The inkling of Off the Hook sighed. "You're really hard to say no to, you know that, Eight?"

 Eight beamed. "Thank you!"

"Uhh… not sure that was supposed to be a compliment, but let's roll with it anyway," Three said.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, so Ao3 changed the way you upload chapters and I have no idea how this is going to turn out. Hopefully it's the same format as usual? Please?
> 
> Anyways, Three and Eight are making a horrible decision. Chastise them in the comments!


	32. Chapter 32

 Marie peeked around a corner with her charger drawn and Four right beside her. She motioned to her girlfriend, and the two moved up.

 Marie had called Marina after their discovery of the missing goo blenders, and the tech wizard managed to find out that the substance gave off a traceable amount of radiation. To be honest, having seen the stuff, it wasn't that surprising to Marie. But the trail led them here, to an abandoned school in ground zero.

 Four's reports had been accurate: the area was depressing. The air itself was stagnant. You could actually _see_ how much the goo laser took away. The streets were empty and decrepit except for the occasional, shambling husk, and everything just felt gray. The same could be said about the school. Everything was completely and entirely abandoned. This much could be affirmed by the empty classrooms they passed by, filled with disheveled and overturned desks. It was unsettling to say the least.

 "Hey," Four said, touching Marie's arm. "You seem upset, but there's nothing we can do about what happened here. What's done is done, and all that."

 Marie exhaled. "Yeah. I guess you're right. I… I just wish I could've done something."

 "No one could have. We weren't there, and everybody who _was_ did the very best they could," Four said. "I don't think there's a single reality where that goo laser could have been stopped, so dwelling on it isn't going to help much."

 "You're right," Marie said, slowly nodding. She peeked around yet another vacant school corridor, but then immediately jumped, startled.

 "What's wrong?" Four asked, hands tightening on her Brella.

 "It's fine. I just wasn't expecting to get a text," Marie said. She took her buzzing phone out of her pocket.

 "You got _that_ scared by your phone vibrating?" Four teased.

 "Shut up," Marie said curtly. She looked at her recent messages. "Oh! It's from Gramps."

 "Ooo, what's it say? What's it say?" Four chimed enthusiastically.

 "He says he finally got everything he needed out of… uh, 'Tartar'. I assume that's the phone thing. And he convinced the Major! The charges on Eight and Marina have been dropped."

 "That's amazing news!" Four cheered.

 "Yeah! Let me call Marina and let her know," Marie said, already dialing the number.

 And then something strange happened. Once she pressed the call button, a ringing cell phone could be heard clearly from around a corner in the school. And a voice came right after it.

 "Shit, should have put this thing on silent!"

 Marie knew two people who would say something like that, and given that the voice didn't sound like Pearl's, Marie was pretty sure who it was.

 She stormed around the corner and watched as the inkling and octoling hiding there flinched at her presence.

 "Three! I told you two to rest!" Marie scolded.

 Three sighed. "Hello to you too, Marie…"

 "Don't give me that," Marie warned. "Leave. Now. Both of you."

 "Uh, no. We're saving Callie together, and I don't care how much you yell at me afterwards," Three said.

 "Please don't get too mad at her, Miss Marie. She just wants to help," Eight said.

 Marie shook her head. She was just about at her wit's end with these two. Well, more with Three. Because Three always pulled this kind of stuff.

 Four rounded the corner. "Oh, hey Three! Hey Eight! You look better than you did yesterday!"

 " _Thank you_ , Four," Three said, smirking at Marie. "We're charged up. Maybe we're not at a hundred percent, but we can push through this. This is time sensitive, so can we just go find her already?"

 Marie briefly considered the pros and cons of strangling her fellow agent, and decided against it. "... Fine. Let's go."

 "Yesss!" Three did a little fist-pump.

 "I _will_ be having a word with Pearl and Marina about this afterward, though. Seems like they actually _helped_ you go against what I asked. I mean, Marina gave you her _phone_ , for Pete's sake," Marie said.

 "Oh, please don't be upset at them either. I take responsibility for this," Eight said.

 "Eight, no, we both know that I was the one who chose to disobey Marie. You just wanted to help," Three said.

 "But I don't want you to get yelled at," Eight said.

 "Both of you, stop," Marie said, cutting off the polite argument. The Squid Sister pinched the bridge of her nose. "Remember, we have to catch Callie before she slips away again. Or she might destroy the city."

 "Yeah, so, uh, let's go," Four said.

 "Right," Three and Eight said in sync.

 

* * *

 

 "Man, this place is way nicer than any of my schools were," Three said. Of course she was a piece of shit runaway child, so she hadn't exactly had the best choice of schools in the first place.

 "You know what's scary? This was my elementary school," Four said. "A few years back, and _I_ could've been in the blast zone."

 "Yo, really? That's crazy!" Three said.

 "Oh no, did you know anyone here?" Eight asked.

 "I dunno. Probably not. I don't think it was a school day when the laser went off anyways, so at least some of the kids here might've avoided it," Four said. "The teachers, too."

 "Well that's a tiny bit of good news in an overall dreary situation," Three said. "So do we have _any_ idea what room Callie's in?"

 "Next to none. Marina's scan gave us the general area of this building but nothing specific," Marie said.

 "Hmm, going in blind, huh?" Three said.

 "Yeah, but that's more fun anyways!" Four said. "Can't enjoy it without it being a challenge!"

 "Babe, I love you, but can you please take this a little more seriously?" Marie said. "My cousin is fighting for control of her own body somewhere in here, and I'm really worried about her."

 "... You're right. I'm sorry," Four said, her attitude immediately sobering up.

 "Wait wait wait, woah woah, hold on," Three said. "'Babe?' 'Love?' What?"

 "Oh, right," Marie said before wrapping her arm around Four. "Meet my girlfriend!"

 Three was stunned for a moment. "... Whoa! Really? No way!" She stroked her chin. She had never taken Marie to be someone who had an interest in women. Oh well, Three supposed she couldn't be the _only_ lesbian in the NSS. Actually, wait, this meant that at least three of the members were gay. She could only hope it was actually four members, because her feelings for Eight would be really awkward if the octoling wasn't also interested in girls.

 Oh look! A new thought to repress! Why was she thinking about this anyways???

 Three's attention was brought back to reality by Eight's voice.

 "Um, excuse me! What's a girlfriend? Does that mean you two are really close friends?" the octoling asked.

 Three's mind told her one thing: panic.

 Marie got a bit of a pitying expression, but then she perked up. "Oh Eight, a girlfriend is-"

 "Th-that's something we should worry about after the mission!" Three blurted out, and she immediately regretted doing so. The knowing, super-smug look on Marie's face meant that she had blown her cover, and there was surely going to be teasing down the line.

 "Oh, okay," Eight said to Three's outburst.

 Marie smirked at Three. "You're right. We should go." She started moving, and the rest of the group followed.

 Three screamed internally as she went. There was just no denying it- she was falling for Eight. No, she had already fallen for Eight. Hell, she was _skydiving_ for Eight. She had been feeling these things for quite a bit now, and the involuntary kiss in Kamabo certainly didn't help. That had made the whole situation so complicated. Finding out that Eight didn't understand the concept of romance put a damper in things, too. This was just… too confusing. The feelings, the situation, _Eight_ … god, Eight was confusing. How could she be so hot and so cute and so innocent all at the same time? It shouldn't be possible.

 Three bumped into Four's back after the group had stopped.

 "Woah there," Four said.

 "Wha?" Three mumbled out. She got _really_ lost in her own thoughts there. And it was really hard to think anyways, because all of a sudden her eye had started having a fierce, stabbing pain in it.

 "Welcome back to reality, Three," Marie teased. "Have a fun time in cupidland?"

 There was the teasing Three had been dreading. "Fuck you," the agent responded, cupping a hand over her pained eyeball. She should have brought pain pills…

 "I want to check the gymnasium," Marie said, no longer with that snide tone. "It seems like a place Callie might be."

 Three looked at the door they had stopped at. "Is this it?"

 "Should be," Marie said, touching the door handle.

 Then the doorway exploded.

 

 Ow. Ow ow ow, her back, her back! Eight had thankfully been the furthest from the explosion, but it still hurt a lot and it also knocked her over and made her land right on the injured area of her back and it hurt _so much_.

 Three struggled up to a kneeling position beside her. "The fuck?!"

 Eight looked at the other two agents. Marie and Four had been closest to the explosion, and they were now out-cold. Not good.

 "Aww, are you all still alive? I knew I should have put those explosives closer to that door," a new voice said. Or not a _new_ voice per se. Quite a familiar one, in fact.

 "Callie…" Three growled. It was exactly what Eight had been thinking.

 The smoke from the door started to clear, revealing the missing Squid Sister sitting on some sort of a high-tech cannon. A cannon loaded with a giant blender.

 "Oh well. I guess I'll just have to kill you with my new toy," the corrupted Callie said, seeming gleeful in imagining all of their painful deaths.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ooooohhhh boy, some shit's about to go down and some squids about to throw down.
> 
> Comment if you enjoyed so I can hear your input and your suffering!
> 
> *muffled mwahahaha*


	33. Chapter 33

 Three didn't hesitate for a second. Her body was screaming at her to stop, but she only had one shot at this. She leapt to her feet and sprinted full-tilt towards Callie with the intention of ripping those stupid glasses off her face.

 Callie didn't seem ready for the move. Three had the jump on her. All she had to do- AAAAAAAGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHH! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!

 

 Eight watched as Three crumpled to the floor, clutching her eye and screaming at the top of her lungs. Callie, even in her brainwashed state, seemed equally confused by the action. The evil pop star then looked at the tank attached to her superweapon and chuckled.

 "Hmm, seems like this stuff doesn't agree with you, Three," she said, flicking the glass of the blender. "Would be a shame if you got covered in it."

 Callie pressed a button on a remote and the cannon she was sitting on turned to aim at the incapacitated inkling. With another button press, the cannon seemed to charge up.

 Eight sprinted forward and tackled Three out of the laser's path. It created a big blast and left a trail of goop, but thankfully the agents were no longer in its path.

 Upon landing, Eight shook her companion. "Three! Are you okay? Talk to me, please!"

 But Three just kept crying out in agony. It was like Eight wasn't even there. She was suffering too much.

 Eight looked up with rage at the Squid Sister who had almost killed the most important person in her life. However, her expression changed to fear as she saw the cannon aimed at the unconscious Four and Marie outside the gymnasium door.

 "No!" Eight shouted before throwing a splat bomb at the gun. The muzzle was knocked off-course just enough to make it miss its target. A splatter of goop hit right beside Marie's shoulder.

 "Hey, fuck off, octo bitch!" Callie growled, and then was taken off-guard by Eight leaping at her. Or at least Eight  _ thought _ she was taken off-guard. This assumption was immediately put to rest when Callie grabbed the octoling by the face in midair and threw her to the opposite side of the gymnasium.

 Eight winced hard as she impacted the back wall and felt a familiar dizziness and room-spinningness after falling to the ground. After a moment of her body refusing her actions, she got up into a kneeling position and sized up her opponent again. So those glasses were also giving Callie super strength? That was… not good.

 "Hey, I thought I told you idiots to make this cannon ink-proof!" Callie shouted.

 Eight's eyes widened as they found who the pop star was talking to- a group of four cowering inklings in the bleachers.

 "I'm s-sorry! It should've worked! I swear! Please don't hurt us, Callie!" one of them sputtered.

 Oh no. Those glasses made Callie kidnap people.

 "Well the cannon works well enough. Guess I don't need you morons anymore anyways," Callie said with an evil smirk. She pressed some buttons, and the gun turned on its fearful creators.

 "Callie, please stop this!" Eight shouted, and then she inked the floor and swam at full speed toward the corrupted idol.

 Callie sighed. "Why won't you just…" she grabbed Eight in octoling form and slammed her into the ground so hard that the floorboards splintered, "... QUIT?!"

 Eight shifted back to her normal form. She tasted blood. She felt like her body was broken. She was going to die. Callie, the inkling who had saved her from the control of the octarian army, was going to kill her.

 "GET AWAY FROM HER YOU BITCH!"

 And Eight, looking up from the ground, saw Callie get slugged in the face by Three and stumble off of the cannon. And then Three leaped down after her and punched her again. And again.

 "DON'T YOU DARE TOUCH HER!" Three screamed, winding up another punch. But Callie was too fast. The Squid Sister grabbed Three by the scarred side of her face and made her scream out in pain.

 

 "I can do whatever I want, pal," Callie said with a cocky smirk, painfully squeezing the other inkling's face. Three clawed desperately at her adversary's hand, but it was useless. The idol's grip was too strong.

 A green spritz of ink, however, forced Callie to dodge backwards and release the struggling inkling. Marie, laying near the door of the room, shakily held her charger at her cousin. She seemed to struggle and fail to find her footing.

 Callie snarled, then lightly kicked Three away, which sent the agent sliding quite a distance. She came to a stop next to Eight, who was also struggling to an upright position.

 "Three, you're alright!" Eight cheered with a strained-sounding voice.

 Three let out a muted whimper. She couldn't help it. It was either that or screaming out in pain. She covered her eye with a hand. It hadn't gotten less painful at all, she was just fighting the impulse to scream about it. But she wasn't above lying to make Eight feel better.

 "Yeah. Let's do this," Three said. She wasn't able to make it super convincing, but she hoped it was convincing enough.

 "Where the hell is my remote?!" Callie shouted from across the room.

 Three and Eight both spotted the device on the floor next to the cannon. Three must've knocked it out of Callie's hands while punching her. Pumped with adrenaline, both agents got to their feet and ran for the remote. Three tripped on the way and crashed to the floor, but Eight kept going.

 

 Eight's eyes were filled with tears. This wasn't the most intense pain she had ever felt (that spot was reserved for something in her past that she couldn't remember), but it was enough that she had to actively resist her body going into catatonic shock. She dove for the remote and snatched it. Then, her arms resisting her every move, she threw it as far as she could from Callie.

 "Give that back!" the brainwashed Squid Sister shouted, and then she had to backstep another shot from Marie. The remote clattered into the bleachers.

 Eight gritted her teeth. She had meant for that to go farther.

 "Stop getting in my way!" Callie growled. She sprinted in Eight's direction with a fist raised before being once again halted by a spray of green ink.

 

 Jeeze, Callie's reflexes were insane now. By now Marie should have hit her at least once...

 "Stop moving, cuz! I'm trying to save you!" Marie shouted, now on her feet.

 "Nah, I like being this way just fine!" Callie shouted before grabbing a spare goo blender. She lifted it above her head, then threw it at full force towards her fellow Squid Sister.

 Marie knew she could easily avoid the attack. The problem was Four, unconscious right behind her. Marie, in what must have been half of a second, dropped her charger, leaped backwards, grabbed Four's Brella, and opened it in front of the both of them.

 The blender shattered upon contact with the too-small doorway, sending glass and goo alike tumbling towards the two. A few shards of glass cut at Marie's ankles underneath the Brella's protection, but thankfully all of the goo slid off of the surface harmlessly. And, after a quick check, Marie was able to verify that Four was completely okay.

 The uncorrupted squid sister dropped the Brella, kicked the goop off of her charger, and looked at the scene inside the gymnasium. And… Three had her arms wrapped around Callie's neck and was riding her like a bear.

 

 Okay, so it wasn't the most elegant option, but it was the best Three had. She dropped her Shooter when she had her little eyeball episode earlier and she hadn't gotten the chance to grab it again. So instead, she was being flung around on Callie's back as the Squid Sister thrashed to try and throw her off.

 "Callie, you've gotta be in there somewhere!" Three said, her voice distorted by the thrashing. She reached for the Squid Sister's shades.

 "Get… OFF!" Callie roared. She got a good hold on Three's torso, then threw her off of herself.

 Three twisted herself in the air and landed in a graceful slide. It was ruined, however, by another spike of pain in her eye. She doubled over and clutched at the source. When she looked up again, she was greeted by a foot to the cheek.

 Three tumbled across the floor, still covering her eye.

 

 "Pathetic," Callie snarled as she lowered her foot.

 "Don't do that to her! You will regret that!" Eight warned before starting to shoot at the black-tentacled Squid Sister. The red ink-splatters hit their mark, but seemed to barely affect Callie at all. Was she getting… stronger?

 "Oh right. The octoling. Forgot about you," Callie said. She, unbothered by the ink fire, grabbed something she had stowed behind her cannon. It was one of the bombs Three had used to get Eight out of jail. Eight's breath hitched upon this realization.

 The brainwashed idol tossed the explosive at her, but Eight was easily able to dodge it. It stuck to the ground behind the octoling. Unfortunately, Three was  _ also _ on the ground behind the octoling.

 "Three, NO!" Eight screamed.

 The green-tentacled inkling clearly knew how much danger she was in, but she was too exhausted to move. For a moment, she seemed to consign herself to her fate.

 Eight wasn't going to let that stand. She dove into Three on the ground and got the two of them to roll what little distance they could away from the bomb. Then the octoling wrapped herself around Three as much as she could to give her cover.

 And the bomb exploded into her back.

 

 "Three! Eight!" Marie shouted.

 "Alright, that's enough out of you," Callie said. She took the giant Splatling she had used at the Off the Hook mansion out from the bleachers and rained ink in Marie's direction. The white-tentacled Squid Sister dragged Four from the line of fire, taking a few hits in the process. From beside the doorway, she firmly shook her girlfriend.

 "Come on, Four. We could really use your help right now…"

 

 Three's ears were ringing and she was still covering her agonizingly painful eye, but none of that mattered as she gazed at Eight's face with teary eyes.

 "Eight?! Eight, why would you do that?! For once in your life, stop being fucking self-sacrificing!"

 There was no response.

 "Eight?! Please wake up!"

 Nothing.

 "Oh, no no no no, Eight, you can't die. You can't die on me here. You just can't!"

 "I… I'm sorry, I... can't hear you very well over the ringing sound my ears are making… What did you say...?"

 Three's heart felt like it was allowed to beat again. "Oh my god, Eight, please…" Three's voice turned to sobs, "Please don't ever do that to me again…"

 "I'm sorry, I don't understand what you mean," Eight said, finally opening her eyes, if only a little. Her face betrayed the massive amounts of pain she was in.

 "Eight, are you okay?" Three asked, not even trying to stop the tears of relief flooding down her face.

 "I… I wish I could say that I am…" Eight said. "But… I don't think I can fight anymore. I'm… I'm exhausted."

 "Yeah… yeah, me too," Three said. Between the sharp pain in her eye and the dull pain everywhere else… she wasn't sure if she would be able to move anymore, much less fight.

 There was some mumbling a distance away from them in the room. Fainter noises were still impossible to hear due to the bomb's impact on Three's eardrums, so she couldn't pick up exactly what was being said. But watching the scene filled in the gaps. One of the kidnapped engineers that had been there the whole time had picked up the remote for the goo cannon. Callie was yelling at him, likely threatening him. And he caved, giving the remote back to Callie. And surely consigning Eight and Three to their deaths.

 "Well… this might be the end," Three said.

 "No… you will figure something out!" Eight said as cheerily as she could. "You're so strong and smart and incredible! You are the greatest inkling- no, cephalopod of all time. You can do this!"

 Three chuckled half-heartedly. "Sure, Eight."

 She clutched the octoling tightly as the cannon started turning towards them.

 

 It seemed, quite literally, that Four woke up at the worst possible moment. Everything was in shambles, there was goo splattered everywhere, something exploded, and Marie looked terrified as she shook her awake.

 "Wha-what's happening?" Four sputtered out.

 "Thank god, you're awake!" Marie said, her whole posture relaxing a bit. "Eight and Three need our help, Four. They need it really badly."

 Four stood up and grabbed her Brella from the ground. It was a little sticky. "Right. Let's go help them."

 Marie held her back and shook her head. "No, they need our help in a different way."

 Four tilted her head, confused. "In a different way?"

 Marie looked at her girlfriend with a gentle but urgent gaze. "Four, you know the song."

 Four stiffened. She knew exactly what Marie was talking about. "But-"

 "No 'but's. They need us," Marie said.

 "... What if it doesn't work if I screw the song up?" Four asked.

 "You won't."

 Marie pulled Four into the gymnasium just in time to see Callie on top of the goo cannon, which was turning in the direction of their two fellow agents.

 "Now or never, Four!" Marie said.

 Four closed her eyes. Who was she kidding? She wasn't Callie. She wasn't anywhere  _ near _ good enough for this. She was just a kid. She was just agent number Four. She wasn't some… master singer like Callie or Marie, or Pearl or Marina.

 But, for the sake of her fellow agents, she could try.

 Marie led, and then Four started singing along.

_ Now we must be strong _

_  Together we will sing this song _

_  And you can sing along _

_  Four? _

_  Marie _

_  We're one and two, and you make three _

_  So sing harmony _

_  And together we shall see _

_  Where we belong. _

 

 For once, corrupted Callie seemed to falter. On the way to press the fire button, she just froze.

 That was very good news for Eight, as she and Three were on their feet again, all feelings of exhaustion purged from their systems. Even the terrified engineers in the sidelines seemed to gain a new feeling of confidence and started cheering for them. It was like magic.

 Of course it was. It was Calamari Inkantation.

 Eight looked to Three. She was no longer covering her eye and… was it bleeding? Regardless, Three gave Eight a nod, and Eight felt compelled to give a nod of her own in response. Then they charged.

 Sensing the impending danger, Callie's finger finally hit the button to fire. By this time, however, the two agents had split into two different directions and avoided the attack.

 Eight bent down while she was running, snatched up Three's dropped Shooter, and threw it over the cannon into the inkling's hands.

 "Why won't all of you just die?!" Callie shouted.

 "We're just annoying like that," Three said before opening fire on Callie. Eight did so at the same time from the opposite direction.

 

_  Now we must be strong _

_  Together we will sing this song _

_  And you can sing along _

_  Four! _

_  Marie _

_  We're one and two, and you make three _

_  So sing harmony _

_  And together we shall see _

_  Where we belong. _

 

 The ink still didn't seem to impact Callie as much as it should have, but it was more than before. The idol at the center of the barrage growled.

 "Enough of this!" She picked her Splatling back up and tried to shoot at Eight, but the octoling dove into an ink puddle and outmaneuvered the ink.

 "Oh Callie~!" Three said, grabbing both the pop star and Eight's attention. Three reached behind her ear and removed an electronic device. Or, as Eight knew it to be, her limiter. "Why don't I give you a piece of your own medicine?"

 The agent's tentacles started burning green, and a giant stamp-hammer came out of nowhere. She brought it down on Callie, who managed to catch it in its path. But it was just a distraction and Eight knew it. Callie threw the Stamper away just to find that Three was no longer behind it. Instead, she came from the ceiling in a Splashdown, knocking the brainwashed Squid Sister off of the cannon she was standing on.

 Upon the idol's ungraceful landing on the gym floor, Eight took her chance to be useful. As Callie tried to get back up, Eight grappled her and kept her in place. Despite Callie's superhuman struggling, Eight was able to hold strong with the power of the Inkantation pumping through her.

 And, in a flash of motion, Three descended upon the Squid Sister and ripped the shades off of her face.

 That was it. It was over. Marie and Four stopped singing.

 Eight, and likely everyone else, thought that Callie would be happy to be freed, but instead tears started pouring down her face.

 "Three, give them back! Please, give them back! I'm nothing without those shades! Please… please…" and then her voice just became incomprehensible blubbering. It was… honestly hard to watch, but Eight kept her grapple on Callie just in case.

 That was, until the effects of the Inkantation began to wear off. Eight's muscles slowly returned to their aching state, and her back once again felt the pain of both Kamabo and the explosion. She let Callie go and tried not to entirely collapse. Thankfully, the Squid Sister didn't try to do anything other than sobbing.

 That was particularly good, because the shades clattered out of Three's hands when she started writhing on the floor, clutching her eye, and screaming with even more agony and desperation then before.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Shout-out to Player2 from musixmatch for the Calamari Inkantation lyrics that I may or may not have slightly altered.
> 
> Also, HAH! You probably thought this battle was going to end on a happy note! That's not what we do here. We only dish out suffering.
> 
> Thank you so much for all the time you spent reading this. The next chapter is the last one of this arc. I hope you've enjoyed!
> 
> Oh, and you could also comment if you'd like.


	34. Chapter 34

 There was a knock on the door.

 "Hey, Eight," Marina said as she peeked in. "The doctors said that we can visit you now. Do you think you would be okay with that?"

 Eight smiled from her hospital bed. Though her voice was weak, it was also cheerful. "I would love that!"

 Marina smiled back. "Great!" She looked at some people behind the door. "She said it was okay!"

 The tall octoling moved further into the room to make space as Pearl, Marie, Four, and Cuttlefish came in.

 "How you doin', squirt?" Pearl asked.

 "I'm feeling a bit better," Eight said, rubbing at a bandaged bump on her head. "I really want to thank the doctors for helping me."

 "They'd better help you. We're paying them to, after all," Marie said.

 "You are? You shouldn't have-"

 "Eight, you saved my cousin. Of  _ course _ I'm going to pay for your medical bill," Marie said. "Just consider it a 'thank you'."

 Eight looked around. "Speaking of Callie…?"

 The white-tentacled Squid Sister glanced to the side. "... She didn't want to go out into public again after what happened. She's… still recovering. Emotionally." Marie nervously scratched at one one of her bandages. "I've signed her up for some counselor appointments. I hope they can help her with her… problems."

 Eight's expression turned sad, as did everyone else's. "Is she going to be okay?"

 "I hope so," Marie said. "While we're on the subject, I thought I'd ask if you'd like me to sign you up for the counselor too. I know that you have some stuff about your past that you may want to talk about with someone."

 "I guess…? I've never been to a counselor before," Eight said.

 Marie smiled sadly. "I know, Eight."

 "Alrighty, time to move to a less depressing topic," Cuttlefish said.

 "Yeah, you're bumming me out!" Pearl said.

 "Wait, are people getting bummed out without me?" came a voice from the doorway. It turned out to be Three, being wheeled in by a nurse.

 Eight felt her heart rate get faster immediately, and a big smile crossed her face. "Three! You're here!"

 "Yeah. Wouldn't shut up until they put me in your room," Three said, teasingly sticking out her tongue. Then she turned her head as best she could to the nurse pushing her to the other bed in the room. "By the way, sorry about that."

 The nurse only grumbled in response.

 Three looked… different. She had an eye patch over the eye that had been hurting her so much, but that was to be expected. What was truly surprising was how her tentacles had changed. Some of the green seemed to have drained from them, leaving them more of a yellowish-green than the bright green that they were before. Eight supposed that was a good sign. That could mean that the goop in her was finally gone. And she still looked pretty this way, regardless.

 "Hey Three, how's the eye?" Four asked.

 "Umm… gone," Three said. "The goop damaged it too much. They had to get rid of it."

 Everyone in the room looked shocked.

 "Oh no! I'm so sorry!" Eight said.

 "Eh, I'm mostly over it," Three said as the nurse got her situated in the other bed. "I mean, I had two of 'em, didn't I? Plus, I'm not in constant pain anymore.  _ That _ feels great."

 "Okay, so maybe this isn't the time and… well, I don't  _ want _ to say I told you so, but…" Marie gestured to the two hospitalized cephalopods, "... you make it hard not to."

 "Yeah, yeah, I know. We jumped into danger even though we were already hurt, blah blah, now we're paying the price," Three said.

 "I think what Marie means to say is 'thank you'," Four said. "Callie was a lot stronger than any of us were expecting. If it weren't for you two, we could've-" She cut herself off. "We appreciate it. Everything you did."

 "Yeah, I guess we did a pretty good job," Three said, exchanging looks with Eight and smiling.

 "Anyways, on to what I was about to say earlier," Cuttlefish cut in. "I was able to get that blasted phone to spill the beans on its plans and on its involvement with the statue's attack. The Major was receptive to the information, and he used his influence to change some things. Eight, you and Marina are not fugitives anymore. You are,  _ officially _ , a free octoling now."

 "I… I… wow… I don't know what to say. Thank you!" Eight said.

 Cuttlefish shook his head. "The only person to thank is yourself. Oh, and maybe Three for dragging you around into dangerous situations."

 "Guilty as charged," Three said, idly feeling at her new eyepatch.

 "No, you saved me, Three. I can't thank you enough," Eight said. Then she turned back to Cuttlefish. "But Tartar... is it-"

 "Yes, the AI megalomaniac is contained," Cuttlefish reassured her. "We're going to find a place where it'll never see the light of day again."

 "Or why don't we nail it to Cuttlefish Cabin? The place could always use some extra decoration," Four suggested with a mischievous grin.

 "Though tempting, that wouldn't be very secure, now would it?" Marie said.

 "... Then why do we keep DJ Octavio there?" Four asked.

 Three made a sour expression. "... You know, I'm not gonna  _ say _ that you have a good point…"

 Eight looked at Pearl and Marina. "So you two are going to be able to move back in to your mansion?"

 Marina nodded. "That's right… though there are plenty of other orders of business that we'll have to deal with first."

 "Like how the police confiscated a lot of the stuff from our house and won't give it back," Pearl said. "Yeah, they aren't allowed to hunt us down anymore, but they are still allowed to be massive pricks."

 Marie seemed to pick up on Eight's confusion from this. "Unfortunately, even though you're free, it's still likely that you're going to run into a lot of issues with people who are prejudiced against you. It's not fair, but a lot of inklings have it set into their minds that octolings are evil."

 Cuttlefish held up a finger, then pulled a magazine out of his satchel and held it out to Eight. "This might help with that, though."

 Eight accepted the offering and examined the cover page.

 ' _ An Octoling Saved My Life! The story of a renowned engineer who was rescued by an escaped convict _ .'

 "Can I see that?" Marie asked. Eight handed the magazine over and Marie flipped to the page of the main story. After looking through it, she leaned in close to Four while mumbling about never letting Callie see the article.

 "Oh, one more thing that I forgot to mention," Cuttlefish said. "In the terms of your acquittal, both of you, Eight and Marina, will have to be supervised by an NSS agent for the next few months. Now, I would have disputed this more fervently, but it actually doesn't seem to be of much consequence in the end." Cuttlefish gestured to Pearl. "As I've been informed, MC Princess, you have been accepted into our ranks recently. Welcome aboard."

 Pearl nodded in understanding. "Ah, I'm picking up what you're putting down, Craig! Loopholes! Smart."

 "And as for Eight..." Cuttlefish said, turning to the hospitalized octoling. His eyes briefly flicked to Three on the other bed. "... Well, I don't think there will be any issues there, either."

 Eight tilted her head in confusion, but Three's voice cleared up the issue. "Yeah, I can take care of it."

 Did that mean that Three was going to be around more? That was great! To be honest, she had been so afraid that she'd see Three less often now that they weren't fugitives. Eight didn't want to be apart from her for that long. The day that Eight had spent in the hospital without her had already been too much.

 "Hey, can I get a moment alone with Eight? There's something I want to talk with her about," Three said.

 Several of the visitors got an expression on their face that Eight couldn't quite parse.

 "Sure," Marie said. "Come on, Four. Let's give them some privacy."

 "Alright," Four said. "Call for us if you need us!" The two left through the door.

 "Yes, let's let them talk," Cuttlefish said to the two Off the Hook members still lingering in the room.

 "Got it," Marina said.

 "Aww, but I wanna watch!" Pearl whined.

 Instead of arguing, Marina merely picked Pearl up and fireman-carried her out the door. Surprisingly, the shorter inkling didn't try to put up any sort of resistance other than pouting. Cuttlefish also hobbled his way out.

 Once their footsteps grew faint, Three started talking again. "You saved my life, like, a  _ lot _ over the past few days, you know that?"

 "You did the same for me," Eight said.

 "Yeah, I guess I did," Three said. She slapped her own hand that was picking at the edge of her eyepatch, seemingly trying to remind herself not to do that. "But, through all of the terrible stuff we've been through, there's been, uh, something I've been meaning to tell you."

 "Yes?" Eight asked.

 "I…" Three paused. "Do you… want to stay with me after we get out of this hospital? I'm sure I can make room for you."

 Eight's pulse quickened in excitement. "I would love that! I would like that a lot. A-as long as I wouldn't be a burden."

 "You could never be a burden to me, Eight," Three said. Her face started flushing a yellowish-green. After a moment, the inkling swung her legs over the side of her hospital bed and stood up.

 "Three, I don't think we're supposed to be doing that," Eight said.

 "I know, I just need to say this next part to your face," Three said. She stiffly wobbled her way over to Eight's bed, bumping into something on the way and mumbling curses about her new lack of depth perception. Then she sat sideways on Eight's mattress near the octoling's legs. "I… god, this is so hard to say… I… um… I love you, Eight."

 "I… I'm sorry, I still don't know what that means…" Eight said. She felt bad, especially since what Three said had seemed so heartfelt. And Three's dejected expression didn't make her feel much better, either.

 "Right, I didn't ever explain that to you, did I...?" Three said. She perked back up a little bit. "Love is… when you care about someone more than anyone else. And… when you want to spend your life with them."

 "You want to spend your life with me?" Eight asked.

 Three nervously scrunched the bedsheets underneath her hands. "Y-yeah. I… I do."

 Eight couldn't help but smile brightly. "I want that too! I'm so glad it's an option!" She happily squirmed a little bit in place.

 "Oh my god, Eight, you  _ can't _ be this adorable," Three said, giggling. It sounded so pretty to Eight.

 "I'm so excited! Maybe I can share your bed in Cuttlefish Cabin!" Eight said.

 "Actually, I don't live there. I have my own apartment," Three said.

 "Then can I share your bed there?" Eight asked.

 Three chuckled. "Yeah. Yeah you can, Eight."

 There was a lull in the conversation as Eight started imagining all of the wonderful things that she could do with Three. Now that they loved each other. Three could teach her about life on the surface, and they could eat some of that unbelievably delicious food, they could cuddle together, and they could… wait, there was something that Three had said before...

 "Three?" Eight asked.

 "Mm?" the inkling hummed.

 "What was it that you said a while ago about a thing that inklings who are in love do?" Eight asked.

"O-oh," Three said, rubbing her own arm. "Uh, we've actually sort of already done it. You know, when I was under mind control?"

 Ah. Yes. That. The thing with the lips.

 "Yeah, I'd get it if you didn't want to do that again. Y'know, after what happened last time," Three said seeming unsure of herself.

 Eight wouldn't have that. She sat up, wrapped an arm around Three's waist, and pulled her in for a kiss. Unfortunately, she was a bit too enthusiastic in this endeavor. She ended up bonking the two of their heads together instead.

 Both cephalopods recoiled, and then started laughing.

 "Ow…!" Three said teasingly.

 "Sorry!" Eight immediately said.

 "Nothing to be sorry about. I think we've  _ both _ had worse head trauma than that in the past few days," Three said.

 "Can we… try again?" Eight asked.

 Three's giggling gently faded. "Yes please."

 Slower this time, Eight leaned towards the inkling she had grown so fond of. Three did the same, shuffling a bit so that she could kiss the octoling more comfortably.

 Just before they made contact, they both paused, unsure of who should close the final distance. Three was the one to relent, and pushed her face the remainder of the way to the octoling's lips.

 It felt… wow. Eight wasn't sure she had ever been taught the words to describe it. The one thing that she could definitely identify was that nice, bubbly feeling that she had felt so much around Three. It was so much stronger and nicer now. With her lips pressed against Three's, Eight could imagine herself forgetting all of the horrible things that led up to this moment and letting this feeling be her whole world.

 Ah. It was love. So that was what love felt like.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you SO much to everyone who commented, kudosed, and bookmarked this fic. I have worked really hard on this, and I'm so glad that it turned out the way that it did.
> 
> This is not the end of these characters' tales. I have some one-shots coming up that will continue their stories as they try to live in this generally unpleasant world. And the next one is coming.... Very Soon!
> 
> Until then, thank you so much for reading and just generally being awesome people. I only expected this fic to get a few cursory glances from people, but it's now one of the higher kudosed Splatoon fics on the site (I checked so you guys could know how awesome you are).
> 
> For one last hurrah, please comment with whatever you see fit. (Yes, this story ended on a happy note. I'm not heartless!)
> 
> (...Or am I?)


End file.
